Industries sacrifice for water

The water emergency in Lethbridge had an impact on industries in the region.

Lethbridge is home to many industries including food processing, manufacturing and a host of others. They also helped conserve water until the situation was rectified. Industries that require water met with officials at city hall to come up with the best ways to do that. Food processing industries had to shut down because of the boil water order. City officials wanted to speak with them directly and thank them for cooperating.

“We had a couple of thousand employees out in the industrial park basically sitting on their hands for most of three days,” said Lethbridge Mayor Chris Spearman. “That’s a big impact for those companies. It’s not something we take very lightly and we understand the sacrifice that was made on this occasion.”

The water emergency also affected industries in the County of Lethbridge. The McCain Foods plant east of Coaldale and the Cheese Factory in Diamond City are its biggest industries. Fortunately, for McCains, part of their shutdown was not because of water but for scheduled maintenance.

“They were shut down for awhile because they were doing some upgrades in the plant and then they were shut down for probably a day and a half or something like that,” said County Reeve Lorne Hickey. “McCains is our largest water user and the Cheese Factory is a fairly close second.”

Mayor Chris Spearman and Reeve Lorne Hickey thanked industries and their employees for the sacrifices they made to help get good, fresh water running again.