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Water and Wastewater Management seems to be the type of vocation that you don’t choose, but that chooses you. Howard Buffi fell into the field decades ago, working first in a small town before moving up to the larger Neepawa system thirteen years ago. Kevin Levandosky became interested while working for the town in another capacity, and was recruited to train under Howard to follow him as the next department supervisor. The work, even at entry level, carries a high level of responsibility on a daily basis.

When Howard started there was no specific certification necessary for the job, but in the years since, several levels of certification program have been put in place. As in many technical and scientific fields, constant education is needed to keep abreast of new technologies and new regulations, and the town supports its staff to be able to do that, both financially and with the time necessary to take the courses.

Neepawa is now on the cutting edge of wastewater technology with its new wastewater plant, which is already partially operational and will become fully operational in the next year. In combination with the nearly-completed reservoir expansion, the system as a whole has seen a lot of changes over the past year. Management of the department needs to monitor usage carefully and know what the needs of the community are going to be not just this year, but five and ten years down the road to be able to push these kinds of expansion projects.

There are a couple of points that Buffi and Levandosky want people to understand about their own use of the town’s water resources. First is that town water is safe to drink just the way it is, without any filters or water softeners. For people who do prefer to have a filter, Buffi reminds us that they should be cleaned regularly or they will do more harm than good to the water quality.

At the other end of the system, and maybe more importantly, blockages in the wastewater pipes are difficult, time consuming, and expensive to fix, and the easiest way to prevent them is to not put grease into the system, whether it is through drains or toilets. The problem is so pervasive that town staff are dealing with it on a weekly basis, despite constant reminders on the subject.

In part two of this interview, Buffi and Levandosky will take us on a tour of the wastewater plant to see how the new technologies work.