At the final Committee of the Whole meeting of 2021, Matt Gruza, City of Martensville Director of Infrastructure and Planning, presented Council with an update regarding the options to upgrade water meters throughout the community.
In October of 2021, Gruza provided Council with a proposal from Neptune Technology Group to upgrade the City’s water meters with new technology that would allow for remote reading. Within the initial proposal, two options were provided; the first would allow for drive by meter reading, which is currently being used within Lake Vista. The second was for a central based radio system (AMI), which would allow meters to be read from City Hall. Following this meeting, Council requested more information regarding the remote reading option.
At the December meeting, Gruza informed Council that administration met with senior representatives from Neptune and provided them with water meter information for the community, which would allow for Neptune to provide more detailed pricing information.
Neptune is currently working on a project within Yorkton and, if the City of Martensville approves this project, there will be a savings of approximately $200,000 as Neptune will begin work in Martensville following completion of their current job.
After reviewing community information, Neptune provided a cost of $1,542,168 (plus tax), which would include a city-wide meter replacement and AMI system installation.
Gruza recommended that Council approve this project, stating that, “This will eliminate the need for our sewer and water operators to go property-to-property, or drive by and complete the meter reads. In addition, this system will be able to help identify leaks and unusually high water use sooner than we were previously able to.” Additionally, by approving this project now, there is a substantial discount for the installation cost. Once complete, this project would also allow for City-wide readings each month, including winter and eliminate any safety concerns of staff performing readings.
Although this project was not included in the budget, and includes a substantial cost, Gruza noted that there is additional Canadian Community Building Fund (CCBF) money which could be diverted to help offset some of the costs.
“It is recommended that we proceed with this project. The additional CCBF funding, as well as the savings of completing this project immediately after Yorkton’s project will result in this being the lowest cost we would be able to complete this project for,” Gruza explained in his report. The project was approved by Council and work is expected to begin early this year.
