Grant to help fund water meter replacement

Boulder City’s scheduled replacement of its water meters received a boost by way of a $75,000 federal grant for the project.

On Feb. 3, the city announced it would be receiving Sustain and Manage America’s Resources for Tomorrow (WaterSMART) funds to help replace 306 residential and commercial water meters with automatic ones.

“The new meters will capture customers’ water usage data by radio transmission,” said Taylour Tedder, city manager. “These meters will report more accurate water usage data, as well as save city staff time, since they will spend less time walking to homes and businesses to manually read and record meters.”

The total cost to replace the water meters is $150,000, and the grant will cover half. The other half will come from the city’s utilities fund.

“This project will increase the reliability of water supplies and improve water management,” said Joe Stubitz, utilities director. “I truly appreciate the support we’ve received from City Council, U.S. Rep. Susie Lee and U.S. Sen. Jacky Rosen on requesting and obtaining this funding. I plan to explore using additional grant funding for future phases of the replacement.”

According to the city, this wave of replacements is the first phase of the project. All 5,000 water meters in town will eventually be replaced.

The purpose of the WaterSMART grants is to conserve and use water more efficiently to help contribute to reliability of the Western United States’ water supply.

“WaterSMART grants are essential to ensuring that states that are susceptible to drought, like Nevada, have the resources necessary to more efficiently conserve water,” said Lee in a press release. “I fought to increase funding for the WaterSMART program, and I am looking forward to seeing Boulder City use this grant to upgrade its water meters and safeguard our state’s precious water resources.”

“With Lake Mead and the Colorado River currently experiencing water shortages, it is critical that we make a concerted effort to conserve the water we have,” said Rosen in a press release. “I applaud the Bureau of Reclamation for funding these grants in Nevada and other Western states in an effort to improve water efficiency and resiliency within communities.”

Contact reporter Celia Shortt Goodyear at cgoodyear@bouldercityreview.com or at 702-586-9401. Follow her on Twitter @csgoodyear.