By TERRY PUGH
Nearly two decades after its tentative beginnings in 2007, the Opimihaw Creek Watershed Association (OCWA) is looking to solidify its existence and implement a long-term plan to improve surface water drainage in the region north of Saskatoon.
A meeting of OCWA stakeholders, including representatives of area municipalities, the provincial government, Water Security Agency (WSA), Meewasin Valley Authority and Wanuskewin Heritage Park Authority, was held January 23. The consensus of the meeting was to work toward revitalizing the OCWA. The meeting in January was a follow-up to an initial re-organizational meeting that occurred in December, 2024.
The OCWA is seeking funding from area municipalities to get the organization up and running again after several years of inactivity.
Martensville City Council discussed a funding request from the OCWA at its regular committee of the whole meeting on Tuesday, February 11. In a letter to council the OCWA asked for $5,000 to “develop a shovel-ready project that will address North Corman Park flooding impacts.” The funding would strengthen the OCWA organizational structure and allow for the hiring of a project manager.
Similar funding requests have also been sent by the OCWA to Warman, Osler, Dalmeny and Corman Park.
At the February 11 meeting, Martensville councillors reached a consensus to stay involved as a member of the OCWA (Martensville has been a stakeholder in the organization since its inception), and participate in future discussions. However, councillors were unwilling to commit any funding to the organization until a long-term direction and strategy is in place.
During discussion at the February 11 council meeting, Martensville Mayor Kent Muench said the OCWA is definitely “an entity worth keeping,” but noted there are divergent views among OCWA stakeholders on what the overall goals of the organization are.
Muench said during the earlier years of widespread flooding, the focus was almost exclusively on drainage to move the excess surface water to the river as quickly as possible. Since that time, he added, there has been increased recognition that natural wetlands, water storage reservoirs and green spaces can be successfully integrated into development plans to better control surface water flows. There has also been extensive work done by the Partnership for Growth (P4G) that takes water flows in Opimihaw Creek into account.
Muench said he was in favour of enlarging the boundaries of the OCWA to include Saskatoon, Wanuskewin and the Meewasin Valley Authority. He added the provincial government has already committed to update topographical data in the region through a LIDAR study slated for 2026.
Martensville Councillor Darren MacDonald expressed the sentiment of a majority of his colleagues, noting he was in favour of participation in the OCWA, but was not in favour of providing funding at this time, particularly since the amount requested was unbudgeted. He said he felt the OCWA should be a participant in the P4G planning process.
Councillor Spencer Nikkel said the issue of water is “very critical” for Martensville and the region as a whole, particularly in regard to concerns about flooding.
“But we need to have a clear idea on the organizational structure and the direction before we provide funding,” said Nikkel.
In a city administration report to the February 11 council meeting, it was noted that the OCWA’s original mandate was “to create and implement a master regional drainage plan, including the construction and maintenance of drainage works for the Opimihaw Creek Watershed.”
The report added that “Previous studies and work were completed to identify and recommend improvements to drainage in the Opimihaw Creek Watershed; however, prior to the construction of any of these works the association became somewhat defunct. Some of this work and background studies have been useful to inform work completed by P4G in the region.”
The OCWA was initially created in about 2007 in response to many instances of localized flooding in the area. During years of heavy spring runoff and above-average rainfall, many low-lying parts of the region were submerged because of the flat topography and high water table. The flooding situation was particularly severe in 2011 and 2013.
In the spring of 2013, the provincial government instituted an emergency flood relief program to assist landowners.
The province also contributed $1 million to the OCWA to plan and implement engineered drainage projects that would help move excess surface water to the South Saskatchewan River. At that time, there were several small drainage projects already on the drawing board, each of which were estimated to cost between $1 million and $3 million. If all the projects were integrated into a comprehensive proposal, the price tag was estimated at about $20 million.
While some engineering studies were carried out in the intervening years with an eye toward a long-term drainage solution, the overall project stalled due to the return of several successive years of low rainfall, meagre snow pack, and overall dry conditions.
But, as participants at the January 23 OCWA meeting noted, weather patterns tend to be cyclical, and the region is likely to see a return of a series of wet years at some point in the near future. They want to have a plan to deal with flooding in place before that happens.