Funding for drinking water initiatives

Government today announced an additional $1.5 million for drinking water initiatives as part of its commitment to ensure the residents of Newfoundland and Labrador have continued access to safe drinking water. This funding is allocated to several government departments to continue to implement safe drinking water initiatives.

The Department of Environment will spend $530,000 to implement phase two of its community-based operator training program and to support the drinking water quality monitoring program. Ralph Wiseman, Minister of Environment, explained that qualified and trained operating personnel for water systems are vitally important to the safe and sustainable operation of water supply systems.

"Last year, the department offered 54 education and training seminars in locations throughout the province. This year, the second phase of the program will deal with on-site training in which the department will work directly with the operators on the systems in their community. This is a very unique approach to operator training and I am very pleased the department is able to implement it," said Minister Wiseman.

In 2002-2003 the Department of Government Services and Lands will spend $458,000 to hire seven new environmental health officers. These inspectors, to be deployed throughout the province, will be involved in the department�s bacteriological sampling of public water systems.

"Environmental health officers (EHO) play a crucial role in ensuring the safety of our drinking water. These seven new officers will increase our current inspections by approximately 25 per cent and bring our current number of EHOs to 36," said Walter Noel, Minister of Government Services and Lands.

Nearly half a million dollars has been allocated to the Department of Health and Community Services to be used in 2002-2003 for three initiatives. Funding will be used to increase the capacity of the Newfoundland Public Health Laboratory to carry out bacteriological water quality testing, to hire an environmental health specialist to lead a health promotion strategy related to drinking water quality issues, and to provide funding to the Health Labrador Corporation and Grenfell Regional Health Services to hire a shared environmental health coordinator to work with the medical officers of health for the two integrated health boards.

"The people of Newfoundland and Labrador have an increasing awareness and concern with respect to the bacteriological quality of their private drinking water sources. To ensure that we can continue to provide high quality testing services free of charge to the public, additional funding for the public health laboratory is necessary at this time," said Health and Community Services Minister Julie Bettney. "As part of our commitment to drinking water safety, the Department of Health and Community Services will also implement a drinking water safety public health promotion strategy."

The Department of Municipal and Provincial Affairs will dedicate a significant portion of municipal infrastructure funding to drinking water and water treatment projects over the next three years.

"In addition, the department will continue the multi-year water disinfection program announced last year," said Municipal and Provincial Affairs Minister Oliver Langdon. "This funding provides municipalities currently under boil water advisories access to100 per cent provincial funding up to a maximum of $100,000 to install or upgrade chlorination and water disinfection equipment."

Media contact: Diane Keough, Communications, (709) 729-2575.

2002 03 21                               3:00 p.m.