The Little Salmon/Carmacks First Nation should have a new water delivery fill station by December.
The Canadian Northern Economic Development Agency, Yukon’s Department of Community Services and the First Nation have all contributed $662,817 to the project, announced Monday. The project’s total cost is $1.98 million.
The First Nation’s water truck currently serves approximately 20 homes and three administrative buildings. With the new, faster facility, an additional 25 homes are expected to be brought on trucked service, said Phil Macdonald, Yukon’s fund co-ordinator.
The new water station will include a building to house the well, water storage and treatment systems, a water truck, office space and a water lab.
The new facility is also expected to offer annual energy savings of $60,000 over the existing water-delivery shed. And the new design lessens the chance of the trucked water becoming contaminated - the current water shed also houses sewage equipment.
The speedier fill station could also prove an asset in the event of a fire.
Between 10 to 15 per cent of the First Nation’s members are on trucked water. The rest depend on wells.
Contaminated well water has been a big concern for the First Nation, which has for years been dogged by boil-water advisories. The Canadian Auto Workers spent the past three summers flying to Carmacks during the summer to help fix most of the contaminated wells.
At the time, the First Nation complained it couldn’t tap federal funding for the work because of strict rules that wouldn’t allow money to be spent on fixing wells that only serve individual residences, as is largely the case in Carmacks.
Contact John Thompson at
johnt@yukon-news.com.