Martensville home and business owners will soon be able to keep track of their water usage in real time.
Martensville City Council voted at its December 21 meeting to award a contract in the amount of $1,542,168 to Neptune Technology Group to upgrade all the city’s water meters to Advanced Metering Infrastructure (AMI) technology. This central-based radio system that would allow the meters to be read from City Hall.
While homes in Martensville’s Lake Vista neighbourhood currently have water meters with built-in radio frequency transmitters that allow for remote readings by public works crews driving past the residences, the majority of homes in the city still rely on direct reads.
As the city continues to grow, the cost of relying on direct-read meters will increase. By moving to an AMI system, particularly one that can be read centrally at City Hall in real time, the municipality will save taxpayers money in the long run.
The new system will allow the city to move to monthly water meter reads, even in the winter. This would allow homeowners to keep track of their water consumption better and take proactive measures if leaks are detected.
Neptune Technology Group is currently installing AMI water meters in Yorkton. The company had indicated to the City that by committing to move forward with a meter replacement project by year end, there would be a savings of approximately $200,000.
The AMI water meters is a cost that was not included in the city’s budget. However, the city administration stated in a report to the December 21 council meeting that there is additional gas tax funding which could potentially be diverted to offset some of the cost. Some borrowing may be required as well.
TRAFFIC SIGNALS
Martensville City Council voted at its December 21 meeting to extend the current Traffic Signal Technical Services Agreement with the City of Saskatoon for another two and a half years.
A one-year agreement was signed in the fall of 2020 that saw the City of Saskatoon provide maintenance and repair services for the City of Martensville’s traffic lights.
In a report to the December 21 council meeting, Martensville city administration reported that the service has been “timely and cost-effective” with better response times than were the case with the previous third-party contractor.
“Over the past year our traffic signal preventative maintenance has better aligned with industry standards and the response time when repairs are needed is almost immediate,” stated the administration report.
The City of Saskatoon has technicians on call 24 hours a day, seven days a week, with a large inventory of supplies so emergency repairs can be performed immediately when they occur.
The agreement can be terminated by either party with 30 days notice.
The cost of the agreement is $12,000, and is already included in the city’s operations budget.
LAGOON PUMP
The City of Martensville is purchasing a new electric effluent pump and other upgrades to its lagoon aeration building to bring it up to the standards required by the Water Security Agency. The upgrades are also needed to satisfy the capacity requirements of the joint water and wastewater project with Saskatoon.
The capital cost of the project is $148,649.
TRANSITION FEES
The regional water and wastewater agreement between Martensville and Saskatoon is one step closer to being finalized.
Martensville City Councillors agreed at their December 21 meeting to endorse the signing of the SaskWater Transition Agreement with Saskatoon and SaskWater.
Under the agreement, Saskatoon and Martensville will pay SaskWater two-thirds of the net margin loss incurred for a ten-year period after the supply of potable water is transitioned.
The payment is to be made in 120 equal instalments of $39,084 (equally split between Saskatoon and Martensville), commencing on the first day of the month immediately following the transition date. The fee may be reduced to account for SaskWater securing new contracts to resell potable water to new customers with existing infrastructure.