City deals with water
BY MICHAEL JOHNSON
Editor
The City of Washburn recently received a 50 percent grant to cover a portion of the cost of a water intake remodel. Unfortunately, that’s not nearly enough for the city to consider the project.
City auditor Milissa Price reported at the last regular Washburn city commission meeting that the city could be awarded $1.8 million of the $3.7 million cost. The work to be done is to move the intake to avoid the current water problems the city is dealing with.
City engineer Jasper Klein said that most entities asked for 75 percent, but the state agreed on 50 percent across the board.
Price has a call into representative Jeff Delzer to see if they can up the appropriations and cover this cost. While the city is getting by with the current intake, there are days that they have trouble pulling in enough water for the need. They would consider this an emergency.
The lower flows coming through the Garrison Dam are adding to the troubles of getting enough water.
Crews brought in by the Department of Transportation cleared away some trees from the bridge pier that were adding to the intake issue.
