Posted on 10/23/2015 by Pete McIntyre 107.5 KISSFM
It's like Water 101 for the committee reviewing Greater Vernon's master water plan.The 18 member stakeholders advisory committee (SAC) is using its first few meetings to learn about the local water system, and vice chair Juliette Cunningham says much of it has been technical. "What's apparent is that the general public is getting an idea of how complicated this has been in terms of Greater Vernon Water and our decisions," she tells Kiss FM.The committee -- which is made up of volunteer reps from residential, commercial, industrial, and agricultural water users -- plans to meet until next spring to come up with recommendations on the future direction of the water plan.On Thursday, the group heard from Interior Health's Regional Director for Health Protection, Roger Parsonage, who outlined how they come up with the safety requirements for water systems."We don't just make this stuff up," said Parsonage.He says the requirements come from BC's Health Ministry, and are based on national and international standards. Cunningham says Interior Health is no longer demanding costly upgrades to the local system, at least not right away., which is a change from a year or so ago. "What's happened since that time is Interior health has backed off a bit, as long as we are showing continued improvement toward the ultimate goal." The committee also heard from the three engineering firms that updated the master water plan in 2012. "Our report is very boring and fact-based. We didn't pass any political judgements. We stick to the facts," said Brett deWynter, engineer from Associated Engineering. Meantime, the SAC has decided it will need more meetings to get its job done. The group had planned to meet once a month, but will hold two meetings in December (3 and 17) to get through all the technical issues being reviewed.
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