City Council OKs mapping software for water department

Submitted by Cameron1 on

By Lindsey Vaculin

General Manager

 

The Cameron City Council moved forward with its work to update the city’s water and wastewater systems with the purchase of Inframap software during its meeting on April 3.

The software, purchased from HD Supply Waterworks, will allow the city to map out water and sewer lines, valves, fire hydrants, meters, etc. on a tablet and computer. The software will allow the city to keep better track of those things for future employees. Employees will be able to do work orders on site.

The council heard a presentation about Inframap during the meeting.

Public Utility Director Gerald Brunson said the system would be a big help to his department with keeping track of where infrastructure is in the ground and what type of material was used in that spot.

Brunson said the cost of the system would come out of his budget at a cost of $17,600. The yearly licensing fee will be $2,000 a year.

Brunson said the system is user-friendly and can be used by anyone.

“We will look at our maps and say, well there should be a 4-inch line here,” City Manager Rhett Parker said. “We will dig it up and either there isn’t a 4-inch line there or there isn’t a line there at all. Some of our information is not great. With this we can go in and correct the information ourselves.”

Parker said city workers will be able to pull up the data and see that there have been four leaks at one spot and that will help them to say OK it is time to replace this line and make decisions.

“Half the time we are doing exploratory digging to find out what is there,” Parker said. “Now we will know what we have done there and what is there.”

Brunson said that probably only about 30 percent of the city’s current maps are accurate and this will help immensely with that issue.

In other business the council also: approved a request for a 10-foot rear yard variance at 1205 Burkett Circle; approved a request to place a Farmer’s Market banner on the lot next to the library for nine months; approved a request to host Family Fun Day at OJ Thomas Park on April 30 from 1-8 p.m.