The City's Waterworks Bylaw has been amended by City Council to, 'represent a proactive step towards improving water management practices, promoting regional collaboration and enhancing community resilience.'

Some of the changes include:

  • Revision of the Conservation Water Use Schedule from a three-level to a four-level restriction format.
  • The addition of a Watering Schedule that is separate from the four levels of water restrictions. 
The City's Waterworks Bylaw has been amended by City Council to, 'represent a proactive step towards improving water management practices, promoting regional collaboration and enhancing community resilience.'The City's Waterworks Bylaw has been amended by City Council to, 'represent a proactive step towards improving water management practices, promoting regional collaboration and enhancing community resilience.' (Graphic credit to the City of Airdrie) 

Eugene Lund Manager of Utility Operations with The City said that the changes stem from what city administration learned from the August 2023 water restrictions, but more importantly, the drought conditions that the province is experiencing this year.

The City of Airdrie has re-tooled its Waterworks Bylaw. (Graphic Credit to The City of Airdrie)The City of Airdrie has re-tooled its Waterworks Bylaw. (Graphic Credit to The City of Airdrie)

"Part of the learnings that we had was that some of the parts of the existing bylaw were singling out businesses and affecting some of their operations. Window washers who were working within The City of Airdrie - the way the restrictions were reading for us is that they were not able to use bulk field stations here within the city," Lund explained. "They were having to transport water from the City of Calgary out to the city of Airdrie."

The City of Airdrie has re-tooled its Waterworks Bylaw. (Graphic Credit to The City of Airdrie)The City of Airdrie has re-tooled its Waterworks Bylaw, but there are exemptions and exceptions within its regulations. (Graphic Credit to The City of Airdrie)

Lund also cited an example from within city departments themselves, adding that the Parks Department 

"They felt that they needed to have more watering done to sport and field Services to keep them in good shape for some of the sporting activities. Consequently, you know, they felt that there could be a reduction in irrigation to some of the parks bases to offset that." 

City documents stated that there are several benefits from the updating of the bylaw including standardization and regional consistency, as well as adding clarity and compliance.

"Clearer guidelines promote greater understanding and compliance among residents, reducing instances of non-compliance and associated penalties."

Lund added that other additional work also revolves around permits and enforcement.

The next steps include a public education and engagement piece to, 'educate Airdrie residents and businesses about the opportunities that exist to improve water conservation practices.' 

However, Councillor Ron Chapman asked if there was any enforcement last year when water restrictions were in place.

"We do have a communication strategy that we have developed with our communications group in terms of how we would like to convey this message out to the community," Lund explained. "Our first step would be to provide some level of education to them. Following that, if an individual was carrying on with an activity after they had received such information, then we would likely be moving to the next steps, which would be the compliance and enforcement that we've included in the amendment."

Lund added that there are additional administrative updates to the existing bylaw that administration would like to represent to council in Q3 of 2024.

"The reason why we have opted to do a two-step process on this is ideally, we would like to have these updated schedule E, which deals with the water conservation implemented before the onset of the summer conditions, just on account of the drought that we're experiencing right now," he said. "We expect that there will be in all likelihood, some form of restriction brought on sooner rather than later. We would prefer not to try and adjust these level three, level four restrictions mid-stream; this confuses the community as a whole."

According to the province, many areas of the province deal with drought conditions, particularly in the southern part of the province. Alberta is currently in stage 4 (out of 5) in its water shortage management response plan. As of April 15, there were 51 water shortage advisories in place for select water management areas across Alberta.

Government data from early March shows that as far as river flow levels are concerned the Bow River near the Mouth, was measured to be 39.9 m³/s, the lowest March measurement in the last 24 years, while the Elbow River at Sarcee Bridge (in late February) the flow was measured to be 2.76 m³/s, the fifth lowest winter measure in the past 25 years.

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