An annual water quality report for Tiny Township filtered into support for additional municipal water meters in select locations, as members of council found savings when residents turned their taps off.
Two reports were provided at the recent meetings, beginning with an annual summary report and quality management standard for 2024 within the township. According to water supervisor Rebecca Raymond, 2024 was a year of safe and reliable potable water for residents.
The township operates 16 drinking water systems, and last year, there were six flow exceedances reported due to four maintenance activities and two caused by a mainline break.
For incidents of adverse events, Raymond said, “In 2024, we had five, and they were all lab samples. Just to give you a bit of an understanding of that, we collect over 13,000 samples a year, so to have five that were potentially ‘somebody touched the inside of a lid’ is only a 0.04 per cent margin of error.
“In any standard, that would be more than acceptable, so I will not complain about those,” Raymond added with a laugh.
One trend pointed out by Raymond was for total annual consumption, which had a historical average of roughly 775,000 cubic metres but had averaged about 900,000 cubic metres for the previous five years; in 2024, that was measured as a downward trend of about 840,000 cubic metres.
“We have seen through the last couple of years (that) anywhere that we are putting (residential) water meters, we have had reduced consumption, so it shows that the efforts of the residents are coming along,” said Raymond.
The report also cited other conservation efforts such as replacing blow-offs with yard hydrants.
It was a note of interest for council members who, later in the committee of the whole, approved installation of water meters in 2025 for Phase 1 of Lafontaine; due to its size, Phase 2 is anticipated for 2026. As well, the 2025 installations will include Rayko, Thunder Bay, and the Tee-Pee Point systems.
Staff anticipated 1,205 services of all connected lots in Tiny (roughly 44 per cent) to be metered by the end of 2025. Since 2021, water meters have been installed in the Wyevale, Perkinsfield, Whip-Poor-Will, and Cook’s Lake systems, as well as for all industrial, commercial, and institutional customers (approximately 24 per cent).
Mayor Dave Evans also attributed the water decrease to the installation of meters.
“Keep in mind, too, that this program is funded by the people that use it,” said Evans. “Ultimately, it’s a cost decrease, too.”
A staff recommendation in the report was to potentially use savings to pre-purchase meters for the 2026 installations as a means to offset tariff impacts.
Said Evans: “Seeing cost inflation, if there was an opportunity to purchase additional units at this price, I think it will behoove us to maybe garner some additional funds and try and lock in inventory if we could for the next year or two at the very least.
“We’re pulling that cost forward, so it’s not so much it would be an increase more in one instance, but over a two- or three-year span, it would certainly make sense, I think,” Evans added.
The committee of the whole approved Kellys Consulting and Municipal Services for $127,976, plus HST, for meter installation, and Evans Utility and Municipal Supply for 540 water meters and transmitters at a cost of $244,863, plus HST.
Archives of council meetings are available to view on the township’s YouTube channel.