Western Bureau Having finally sourced the funding for a $200 M water project in the Askenish section of Hanover, the water ministry recently broke ground on the project, and has set a February 2002 completion date.

Attempts to identify the current source of funding were unsuccessful, but according to water minister, Karl Blythe, the project was not an election gimmick. Rather, Blythe insisted that it had been in the pipeline for quite a while, but had failed to get off the ground because of a lack of funding. He explained further that the ministry had not wanted to press ahead with the project earlier, only to have it stalled because of inadequate funding.

The communities slated to benefit from the project include Hillsborough, Dias, Water Cress, Kingsvale, Greenland, Middlesex, Eaton, Little Gate, Mount Piece, Cacoon, Chambers Pen, Clifton, Riley Pen, Harvey River, Blenheim and McLaren.

Blythe said this water supply scheme was expected to pump water along 9.85 kilometres from Kew to a 150,000 gallon storage tank at Dolphin. The commodity will then be gravity fed from a 150,000 gallon tank in Askenish to members of that community.

He maintained also that because of the importance of the project, work would be done “in-house” by the state-run National Water Commission. He added that private contractors would only be called in as a last resort.

Blythe went on to warn area residents that work on the project would not be awarded along partisan political lines. “Water has no colour,” he said, while stressing the fact that pipe laying was a technical job which required “some level of expertise”.

He gave no start-up dates for the commencement of phase two of the project, but 10,000 persons are expected to benefit when the entire project is completed.