Abandoned Stuff by Saskboy

The small village of Wood Mountain has been partially convicted on the multiple counts of water distribution charges that Saskatchewan Environment and Resource Management brought against the village. One charge was dismissed, and one was stayed. The judge noted in the decision that the provincial governing body in Regina should not be making laws for which municipalities have no financial way of obeying.

- Auction on Main St. Wood Mountain April 7, 2007

“As long as a private individual operates the well which pumps less than 1,800 cubic metres of water in a 24-hour period, it does not fall under [the Saskatchewan Environment Department's] regulations,” he said.

In 2000, new provincial regulations required municipalities to chlorinate water.

Wood Mountain refused and the Environment Department took it to court.

Klein argued residents were happy with their water and maintained the community doesn’t have the money to chlorinate.

More than half of the community’s 20 residents have their own wells anyway, he said.

At the end of the day the province is poorer, the village is $1000 in the hole, and the water being consumed by the village residents is no more dangerous (or safe) than it was yesterday. The thousands of dollars and hundreds of man-hours wasted on convicting/defending the village would have been better spent as a grant to the community so they could install a sterilization system superior to a SERM endorsed chlorination system that produces “safe” water (yet contains an increased risk of cancer and a nasty odour and taste).

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Another area of the province that has been all but fined by the province for going about its business, is Highway 15* by Nokomis. Here’s a town that is isolated in several directions by a highway (opens Google Map) that has been allowed to completely disintegrate to the point where it risks life and limb to drive on it!

Mayor Willard Beeler said a section of Highway 15 that washed out on the weekend is now a crater more than 10 metres across and 2.4 metres deep, and has cut off an important link between his town and Watrous, especially for people who commute between the two communities for work.

It is caused by flooding from spring runoff. The problem for Nokomis, a town of about 440 people 136 kilometres north of Regina, is that the alternative route is threatened by rising water levels, too.

“Right now, they can go four miles south and come east and get around what we call the Simpson grid,” Beeler said. “But that’s at the end of Last Mountain Lake, and once the rest of this snow melts, I imagine it’s going to be gone as well.”

Sitting in Nokomis’s Atlantic Cafe, rancher Lorne Thomson said road conditions in the area have always been poor, but more work should have been done to make sure Highway 15 could handle the high waters.

“The best thing they could do is have [Premier Lorne Calvert] take a little tour of our roads and maybe realize that we pay taxes too,” he said.

Saskatchewan Highways isn’t optimistic the road will be fixed any time soon, saying the flood waters need to go down first — and the roadbed needs to be dry before it can be fixed.

Minister Lautermilch and the NDP are responsible for the province’s crumbling infrastructure, and their cabinet would rather go around fining communities for not installing things they don’t want and can’t afford anyway, than go about maintaining the basic government responsibilities like roads we need to build our provincial economy upon.

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* I’ve written about Hellway 15 before, many times.

UPDATE: Meg confirms that Highway 15 is, and has been, the pits. I drove on it first in 2000, and it was horrible then. It was the first highway I’d seen in this province that was actually just gravel while being labeled as pavement on maps and signs.