By Greg Nikkel
A construction project at the former St. Dominic School site helped the numbers of building permits issued by the City of Weyburn stay on par with last year.
In the April building permit report, the city issued five building permits in April worth a total of $1,323,000.
These include two permits for residential addition or alteration, with a total value of $105,000, two permits for residential detached garages worth $18,000, and one permit for a multi-family development worth $1.2 million.
The latter permit is for work developing a new care facility at the former St. Dominic Savio school on Fourth Street, which will develop 14 dwelling units. The developer is Mel Van Betuw, who bought the former elementary school building.
This brings the year-to-date total to 14 building permits worth a total of $3,187,600.
This compares to a year ago when the city had issued 13 permits worth a total of $3,686,050.
• In the April report from the water filtration plant, all bacteriological samples taken showed negative results.
In quarterly samples of THMs, the results showed the city’s water is 15.3 per cent over the drinking water standard, and up by 11 per cent from last quarter.
There was a similar result for the quarterly samples of halo acetic acid, which was 18 per cent over the drinking water standard and up 11 per cent from last quarter as well.
With the rise in temperature generally, the turbidity of raw water has increased with a lot of organic and inorganic material in the water. The treatment plant was able to adjust chemical treatment levels to produce quality water without any problems.
The level of Nickle Lake is 72 centimetres from full level, which is below the average for the last 14 years. City council has introduced a bylaw for water conservation, which will be voted on at the Tuesday, May 24 council meeting.
• The Nickle Lake Regional Park board expressed an interest in obtaining the washrooms which were removed from Tom Laing Park, offering to buy them for $2,000 unless the council felt a donation was in order.
Coun. Winston Bailey asked if the washrooms might be donated, but fellow council members shot the idea down.
Coun. Rob Stephanson pointed out there are many other organizations in the city who could use these washrooms, even though none of them expressed any interest like the Nickle Lake board did.
“I wouldn’t support just giving it to them, and from the reports I saw, $2,000 is low, so we are donating to them in a way,” he said.
Coun. Mel Van Betuw agreed, noting he believes the washroom facility is likely worth a lot more than $2,000.
“I would agree. I have a seasonal site at the park, and I think the park is doing a wonderful job. If we were to offer it for donation, it should be something we offer to the public. I think $2,000 is fair, and that will save them money over the years not to have to rent portable washrooms,” said Mayor Debra Button.
• Coun. Stephanson reported to council he was recently in Ottawa for the national meeting of the Canadian Association of Police Governance, representing the Weyburn Police Commission.
One of the highlights was the discussion over the federal government’s intention to legalize marijuana by 2017.
“We need to be at the table, because it’s the local police who are going to be tasked with monitoring this. We were told very clearly, this is happening. There is going to be obvious costs at the local level for training and equipment,” said Coun. Stephanson. “We’re looking forward to more discussions, because they’re aiming for next spring.”
• Coun. Laura Morrissette reported that the spring book sale held by the Weyburn Public Library raised a total of $4,247, which will be used to buy new program materials for the library.
