Province announces first round of grants tied to drought and flood mitigation

The Alberta government says it has approved grants to 14 municipalities, two First Nations and one Metis settlement seeking to develop drought and flood mitigation projects.

It's part of a $125-million drought and flood grant program, which was outlined in March and would allocate $25 million per year from 2024-25 through 2028-29.

The province approved funding for 18 applications, with Rocky View County receiving funding for two projects.

As a part of the first round of funding, $25 million will be paid in 2024-25 and $5.7 million will be used from the 2025-26 allocation. Announced funding approvals include projects tied to the City of Calgary, the City of Brooks, Fort McKay and the Town of Canmore, among others.

It will also include more than $400,000 for the Municipal District of Pincher Creek.

Earlier this year, officials with the M.D. were forced to truck in water as dropping levels in the reservoir meant the M.D.'s intakes — which pipe flow to the plant — breached the surface, making it impossible to draw water. 

"The alternative we came up with was to develop … we call it a vertical infiltration system," said David Cox, reeve of the M.D. of Pincher Creek.

"We did some research on a couple of reasonable aquifers, and developed them as a backup. So now if the water level in the dam drops below the intake pipe levels, we have an alternate source of water."

Cox said the M.D. invested the money to build the infrastructure and then applied for a grant to offset the costs.

Paul McLauchlin, president of Rural Municipalities of Alberta, said he expected the funding would have a "positive impact" on the association's members.

"This is one of those critical infrastructure conversations a lot of people don't talk about. Water, wastewater, is definitely very vulnerable to weather-related events," McLauchlin said. 

"The ability to actually fund these type of projects to determine risk and then mitigate, I think, is a valuable exercise."

Given the risks at play for flood and drought in Alberta, water and wastewater are of critical importance to Albertans moving forward, according to McLauchlin.

"I expect this is only a small portion of the funding that would be required to mitigate most of the vulnerable communities across Alberta," he said.

"The first step [for communities will be] determining your vulnerability, the second step would actually be finding resources in order to correct this."

The province said applications will be accepted each year, and application dates will be posted online later this summer.