Business View Magazine | March 2018

128 legends–and,of course,plentyof fireworks. Recently,BusinessViewMagazine spoke withmem- bers of Timmins citygovernment to find out what was going on in town,andwhat projects were at the top of their department agendas. PublicWorksManager Ken Krcel talks first about the street light retrofit program that the city just complet- ed: “We convertedall our incandescent street lights within the city to LED,”he reports.“We changed about 4,000 fixtures and the net project cost was about $2.2 million.We’re looking at a three to fouryear payback that will cover the cost of the lights.Themajor factor was cost savings for our electricbills,but it also helps the environment and saves moneyonmaintenance- LED lights last a lot longer and use less energy.” Another major project that the cityhas undertaken is the reconstruction of 21 kilometers of themain highway that bisects the city.“Back in the early’90s, it was a provincial highway that was ‘downloaded’to the city,which took it over andworked tomaintain it,” says Krcel.“But,it’s in averypoor state of repair.So,we worked on a ten-year plan to reconstruct this arterial, four-lane road.So far,we’ve completed two phases of it-each phase costing,roughly,$4million. Steve Kukulka,PublicUtilitiesManager reports that a $5.2millionUV treatment project for the city’s sanitary water systemhas just wrapped up.“It serves as a pri- marydisinfection and reduces the amount of chlorine in the system,”he explains.Another project just com- TIMMINS, ONTARIO