Pateros City Council gets good news on new well water quality and quantity

PATEROS – Engineering and management consultant Ben Varela of Varela & Associates of Spokane updated council members on the water quality and quantity of the city’s new well project during the regular monthly meeting of the city council last Monday, Dec. 18.
Varela had good news in the form of very low manganese readings – well below current well numbers - at both new well sites at Pearl Street and Lakeshore.
“We don’t have all the water quality results back yet,” said Varela “but that part of it is looking really good.”
Varela said the water quantity is high and estimated volume at around 2,000 gallons per minute from each well, “better than anyone could have hoped.”
The results so far show the potential to double the city’s water capacity with little or no issues or costs associated with manganese content.
Varela said some extra time and work was required to address fine sand in the initial water withdrawals and recommended further pumping by the contractor, Blue Star, to remedy the condition.
Work on the storage reservoir near the cemetery has been shut down for the winter and should resume next spring, Varela said.
In response to a question from councilman George Brady about finances, Varela said the project is both on budget and on schedule.
In other business Mayor Carlene Anders explained the process of reviewing and rating county infrastructure projects with the Economic Development District.
“We rate projects here in Okanogan County through Economic Alliance and all the projects are streamlined through the county here and then move on to the North Central Washington Economic Development District,” Anders said.
The 2018 Okanogan County Prioritization List includes the Pateros Starr Road Business Development that is ranked third among the six projects on that list.
City Administrator Jord Wilson reported on calculated savings of the city’s Relight Project.
Wilson said the 2016 street light rate was $813. The 2017 rate increase raised that to $938. The new Relight project brought the cost down to $709 for a savings of about $148 from the previous rate.