ATHABASCA – The consortium of municipalities that makes up the Aspen Regional Water Services Commission (ARWSC) will pay more than $2 million more than expected for the planned river intake system replacement, after the bids received blew those plans out of the water.
At ARWSC’s April 6 meeting, the partners met to discuss the recent tender that was sent out so the work could finally be completed this year. The low bid was far above the initial cost estimate of $2.7 million at $4,742,287. With engineering costs, that number increases to $5.17 million.
The Town of Athabasca, Athabasca County and Village of Boyle have been working for years to have the integral starting point of the collective water system upgraded to replace the current 65-year-old intake, at the old water treatment plant near the Independent grocery store, that takes raw water from the Athabasca River and sends it to a storage pond at the water treatment plant on 34 St., where it is treated and then piped out to the town, to Colinton and Boyle, then to Grassland and Wandering River.
Commission members were tasked with bringing the information and the request for additional funds back to their respective councils, and to do it quickly, as the bid is only valid for 30 days (with a 30-day extension, if agreed upon) before a new tender would have to go out, and odds are it would come back even higher.
The town, which uses 63 per cent of the water treated from the plant, is now on the hook for an additional $1.3 million; the county has to come up with $324,412 for its 17 per cent of the usage; and the village needs $373,073 for its 20 per cent portion.
“We’ve got all our approvals in place and we’re basically way down the road here with this project,” ARWSC chair and county Coun. Kevin Haines said in an interview the next day. “We have a pretty tight timeline, and the other part of the timeline is actually the river work itself, they're wanting us to be in there in mid to late July, early August. So, we have to make sure we accept our tender and we have to get them as ready as they can be, and to meet our timelines for our environmental improvement approvals. So that's kind of the push."
ARWSC manager Jaime Gibersen’s request for decision provided some background information for members at the April 6 meeting as well. This whole process started in 2015 when the town unsuccessfully applied for Alberta Community Resiliency Program (ACRP) funding. Another application for the grant was successful in 2016 and partial funding was received in late 2017.
In mid-2018, the ARWSC learned it could leverage the ACRP funding to apply for the Investing in Canada Infrastructure Program (ICIP), in which it was successful — MLA Glenn van Dijken visited Athabasca, along with infrastructure minister Prasad Panda last fall, two full years after the application to hand over the funding. The tender was released in January and came back March 23, hence the urgent meetings by all three municipalities last week.
The town’s representatives on the commission, Coun. Dave Pacholok and Coun. Ida Edwards, explained what happened earlier in the day, at the April 6 town council meeting.
“The consensus from the board was to go back to our municipalities and suggest that we would ask for a total of$2 million from the three municipalities in order to further subsidize what's needed for this project and go ahead with it anyway,” said Pacholok. “We decided that it wasn’t going to get any cheaper. We decided that the prices are definitely going up in all respects.”
Coun. Edwards agreed, noting the production of stainless-steel products made in Texas is at a low point due to storms and a general recession of the economy.
“Now we’re looking at cost overruns by the day for the cost of these stainless-steel products, and we’re really concerned that if we don’t lock in to this project, and secure water for our community in Athabasca, and the regional community in the county. We’re going to have some problems, or delay,” she said.
“We can’t hold off on this at all. It has to be done,” said Coun. Tannia Cherniwchan.“It’s for our safety, and we must do it. So, that’s just the way it has to be.”Councillors voted 5-1 to instruct administration to draw up a borrowing bylaw for $1.26 million, over 30 years.
Coun John Traynor provided the lone no vote saying he would rather see a one-third split between the three member municipalities.
“It’s a big project. I’m just kind of disappointed that this hasn’t across our table at some other earlier point, because I don’t remember anything about this being discussed in a budget meeting or anything, I’m disappointed, "he said. “And the second thing is I don't have an option of digging a well herein my town. Other people do in the county. And you know, if water is super important for everyone, I think everyone should have to pay their fair share, and that means 33 per cent each in my view.”
Village of Boyle councillors went into a closed session at their April 7 meeting, and came out to pass a motion to borrow $400,000 over a five-year term.
“Our council agreed that water is a very crucial thing for any community and that we are willing to move forward ASAP in order to get this project going,” said mayor Colin Derko via e-mail the next day. “We decided to borrow the money simply because the interest rates are so good, and if we use our reserves, we run the risk of not having money for future potentially crucial water projects.
The village has been responsible in the past which has left us with ample reserves; however, we do not want to leave ourselves short in the future. It is very time sensitive and we recognize that none of us want to spend money, but the fact remains that it needs to be done.”
Athabasca County held a special meeting April 8 to discuss their options.
After Haines addressed the situation, he explained that of the three bids received, the two low ones were very close to each other, which indicates to him that is a market value price.
“After the tenders were put in and (engineers) went back to the companies and asked them what made them tender that price, and they were told, basically it came down to the risk of the river work because it’s a fast-moving river, and the amount of risk involved, and the type of job that it was. And the fact that it’s a small job they have to bid a little bit more as well, which doesn’t make a lot of sense, but that’s what they say.”
Coun. Dennis Willcott didn’t see a lot of sense in going back and forth when council had no choice to accept the bid and make sure the work gets done.
“I’m going to make a motion to move because it’s common sense, we got no other choice, and we don’t have to beat this up, but anytime contractors know, I said it before, that they give a free money, we’re going to get double prices.
Things should be going down now, a little job normally is cheaper just to keep your people working, but this has backfired, he said.
The meeting lasted all of 10 minutes and ended with council voting unanimously to use $340,000 from the water equipment and upgrade reserve.
Commission members will now take their councils’ approvals back to the next ARWSC meeting, and approve the low tender to have the work completed this summer.
“If we get this intake fixed up the way it’s going to be with the proper screen, it’s gonna have proper screens, it’ll actually have a backflow — it’ll have an air backflow that we can flush the line with if we need— and it’ll be, I’m thinking you’re looking at a line that hopefully will service this community for 70 or 80 years,” Haines said.
The work is set to take place from July 15 to Sept. 15.
