Levee District 3 Board Passes Budget That Includes Pump Station Upgrades, Drainage System Maintenance

Setting aside additional money for pump station upgrades and drainage system maintenance, the Levee District 3 board approved a $360,710 budget for fiscal year 2020 — up from last year’s proposed budget of $251,500 — at its June 10 meeting.

The pump station upgrade and drainage maintenance are new line items for this year, adding a total of $100,000 to the expenditures. The pump station upgrades, listed as $25,000, include adding a second computer and updating equipment.

“We need to get a transducer that can read the surface, so we don’t even need it in the water,” president Vern Bauman said.

In 2018, six submersible transducers had to be replaced when one of the pump station’s Flygt PL7121 pumps was pulled for repairs.

The transducers record the river’s elevation, but the submersible style has not worked well. Bauman explained the issues in a phone call later in the week.

“We’ve had trouble with it, and they can’t replace the wires through the concrete,” he said. “We had trouble getting readings a lot of times with that style. Their little float goes up and down in the water, but they get hung up or something gets in there or whatever. They’re not a good, reliable transducer.”

See complete story in the June 19 edition of the Herald.