Despite not having a site selected for its second test well, the Clancy Water and Sewer Board has taken the initial steps in the bidding process for the project in hopes of shortening the wait time once a location is selected.
Great West Engineering Project Engineer Joel Pilcher, who is filling in for Collette Anderson while she is on maternity leave, suggested that the board submit a generalized bidding invitation since contractors’ schedules are filling up, which could extend the project’s timeline.
The invitation informs contractors that the test well will be dug on a property within “the Clancy area” or a one-mile radius of the town.
The invitation to bid also includes the cost of monitoring surrounding wells during the test pump to ensure they are not impacted.
“Everything is so close within Clancy and this district, that that’s something that needs to happen,” board member Bob Johnson said. “It would make a lot of people feel more comfortable.”
Pilcher said either Great West or the well digger would handle the monitoring of the wells during the test pump. The Clancy Water and Sewer District has two options for the duration and intensity of the test pump: a 24-hour pump and 1.5 times the district’s target flow or a 72-hour pump at the target flow. To ensure the test well could provide water to the entire district, the target flow has been set at 150 gallons per minute.
At the board’s Sept. 27 meeting, it gave Great West Engineering permission to draft and send a test well easement agreement to Steve Marks for a property of his known as “the meadow” located south of the Legal Tender. Marks had yet to sign the agreement by the board’s Oct. 25 meeting.
Johnson said that if the test well goes in the meadow, the board will reach out to Red Cliff Estates to monitor its impact on the subdivision’s wells.
Following the board’s September meeting, it received what Board President Lori Gilliand called “exciting news.” Russ Kalchbrenner contacted the board with the hopes of providing a potential test well site.
The property in question is nearly 189 acres large and sits just to the west of Clancy School on Clancy Creek Road.
Russ Kalchbrenner is the son of Virginia “Ginny” Kalchbrenner, a Clancy native who now lives in a nursing home and is working to consolidate her properties.
“Our intention was just to sell it,” he said, but all that changed after learning about the board’s need. “We’ll sign whatever, let [the district] do a test well.”
Russ Kalchbrenner, a Clancy native who now lives in Tennessee, said he learned of the district’s need for a well site after speaking with Keith Foley, owner of property neighboring the Kalchbrenners’. Following the conversation with Foley, Russ Kalchbrenner approached his mother with the proposal. Ginny Kalchbrenner said she is eager to help Clancy in its pursuit of a centralized water source.
“I lived in Clancy all my life and I wanted people to be able to have their water, because with no water they can’t live there,” Ginny Kalchbrenner said.
Finding a clean water source is especially important to Ginny Kalchbrenner after seeing her parents’ drinking well get contaminated during her childhood, leading to the death of all her mother’s plants. She also said the importance of clean water was emphasized to her through her father’s profession as a well-driller.
“Without water, you can’t live there,” she said.
If the well does not produce water, Russ Kalchbrenner said the property will be sold; however, if the well is successful, the family and lawyers will decide how to proceed at that time.
Although members of the Clancy Water and Sewer Board have yet to tour the property with Great West to determine a potential location, Ginny Kalchbrenner told The Monitor that “anywhere really” would work.
“That area was kind of a preferred location from a hydrogeological standpoint,” Pilcher said during the water district’s October meeting.
One area that Russ Kalchbrenner expects to be a desirable well location is south of Clancy Creek in a sandy area, cleared by a dredger. However, municipal water supply regulations may prevent the location from being utilized.
Pilcher told The Monitor that the district’s water system must be 100-feet from all property lines, septic tanks and drain fields, roads and any surface water.
Additionally, the well must have a controlled 100-foot radius controlled by the district either by easement or ownership. This radius ensures the “continued protection of the well site from potential sources of contamination,” Pilcher said.
He went on to explain that the site should have adequate room for a second well and a small well house building for pipes, equipment, meters and controls.
Despite the board’s new option, it has decided to continue pursuing the Kalchbrenner and Marks’ properties on a “parallel track.”
The Clancy Water and Sewer Board tentatively plans to meet again on Nov. 11 at 6:30 p.m., depending on board member Bill Hammer’s hunting schedule during the final week of rifle season.
