Mason City council approves first step in making upgrades to water treatment plant

MASON CITY — The City Council in Mason City this week approved the first step in making upgrades to the city’s waterworks plant. The city’s electrodialysis reversal treatment plant was placed in service in June 2004, and after 20 years of service and about 37 billion gallons of treated water, the individual components if not already replaced during regular maintenance schedules have exceeded their expected life.

Mayor Bill Schickel says the city needs to move forward with planning with a major upgrade. He says recent tests show that the plant has performed remarkably well.  “We got some water samples back in both January and July of this year, and it tested for 30 different possible contaminants in the water. There were zero. There were no contaminants in your Mason City water supply. When you get a drink of water, when you take a shower, you can feel confident that water is very, very clean.”

Microplastics getting into water supplies are a new concern for communities in Iowa, but Schickel says there’s nothing to worry about in Mason City according to those recent water tests.  “Some communities in Iowa have experienced these microplastics as well. There are no microplastics in the Mason City water supply.  That’s not only because we have an outstanding water treatment plant and an outstanding water treatment system, it’s because we are very fortunate to draw our water from very deep aquifers here, the Jordan Aquifer, and it takes literally thousands of years for the rainwater and the water that seeps through the ground to get down into that Jordan Aquifer, and by the time it gets there, it’s very clean.”

The council this week approved a professional services agreement with SEH of Mason City for the preliminary design of the water plant improvements.

Schickel made his comments on the “Ask the Mayor” podcast which you can hear by clicking here