The Park City Council will receive an update Tuesday on the 3Kings Water Treatment Plant, as part of an ongoing effort to keep the council apprised of the years-long project.
Park City Municipal will replace the existing Spiro Water Treatment Plant with the new 3Kings Water Treatment Plant, to comply with state requirements for improving water quality from the Judge and Spiro tunnels. Interim City Manager Matt Dias says the city council has requested more transparency from the public works department on the costs and progress associated with the planning and design of the project.
“We have an extremely complicated treatment system, as a result of taking our water out of the mines," Dias said. "We’re also under a compliance order from state entities for mine water treatment, and because of that, when you put those two together, we've got this very, very complex, very, very sophisticated project that we'll be bringing online in the next two years.”
So far, the council has approved $15.3 million in contracts related to the 3Kings plant. The total project is estimated to cost $100 million over the next five years. Dias says the city renegotiated the costs down with the state.
“We went back to the drawing board with the state, and we actually made a plea and said that this isn't fair to our ratepayers, the cost was exorbitant and we didn't think the ratepayers could support it," Dias said. "Fortunately, they were sensitive to our argument, and about two years ago we renegotiated our treatment philosophy, the size and the scope of the treatment facility and we were actually able to reduce costs.”
Dias says ratepayers will support the cost of the project.
“Typically overtime, we have had relatively low water rates in Park City, and so now that we've been raising them overtime, we have a water model, a funding model that can pay for this.”
The city council will receive an update on the costs during a work session Tuesday, starting at 4 p.m. in council chambers.
