Mayor Ron Hovanes (forefront) and councillors Larry Schwartzenberger, Maureen Doerr and Petra Veintimilla attended the UBCM convention in Victoria recently.
The Town of Oliver is hoping its recent attendance at the UBCM convention will result in some big money to help fix a broken irrigation canal.
“We planted some needed seeds,” said Mayor Ron Hovanes, who recently returned from the Union of BC Municipalities annual meeting.
Hovanes was accompanied by fellow councillors Petra Veintimilla, Larry Schwartzenberger, Maureen Doerr and summer student Kamila Jones.
The finance department has not yet confirmed what it cost to send the Oliver contingent, but the mayor has always defended these trips for yielding great benefits (water-twinning and Main Street repaving, for example).
“It’s always important to attend the UBCM . . . you need that 15 minutes with the cabinet ministers to send a clear message,” Hovanes said, adding that council comes back to Oliver “energized.”
What they are most energized about is getting funding to help repair the irrigation canal that was damaged by a rock slide at Gallagher Lake in January.
A temporary repair was completed this spring, but now a permanent repair is needed.
The Town has identified four options costing from $4.5 million to $14 million.
Repairing the existing siphon would cost $4.5 million, while building a new siphon in Gallagher Lake would cost $9.7 million. Tunneling the canal through the rock bluff would cost nearly $14 million, while rerouting the siphon to follow Highway 97 would set the town back about $10 million.
Hovanes asked Minister of Transportation Todd Stone to partner with the Town to access immediate funds to repair the siphon.
The mayor explained that the canal delivers irrigation water to more than 5,000 acres of farmland in Oliver and Area C (rural Oliver).
He also mentioned that the total potential losses from a crop failure, replanting and recovery delays would be approximately $172 million.
Hovanes told the Chronicle that rerouting the siphon along Highway 97 makes sense.
Whatever the outcome, the mayor commended Boundary-Similkameen MLA Linda Larson for actively looking for a solution for the Town.
The second issue that Hovanes discussed with another cabinet minister was funding to rehabilitate the entire irrigation canal system that requires upgrading.
The third issue that the Oliver contingent brought to the table was a request to Health Minister Terry Lake for funding to create a federated virtual electronic medical records system. Hovanes said this would reap multiple benefits including reduced wait times and increased access to information.
By Lyonel Doherty
