Kincardine is a step closer to being sole owner of the Bruce Energy Centre.
At a special meeting Wednesday night — councillors agreed to take over the water and sewage treatment plant, currently being run by Bruce Power.
The facility itself is leased from Ontario Power Generation.
But not all councillors are buying into the deal.
Councillor Ron Hewitt says he hopes the majority of councillors are correct in moving ahead.
He says council believes property owners in the area waiting for water and sewage service will be able to tap into the municipally owned facility.
Hewitt says under the purchase deal if anything goes wrong at the plant, the municipality will be on the hook.
He says that’s not a good deal in these tough economic times.
He would have liked to have taken over the Bruce Power lease for the next 5 or 10 years to see how the facility operates.
Hewitt says then they would have a better handle on what kind of a plant it is and what it would cost to operate it.
Bruce Power is on record as wanting to get out of this aspect of the utility business so it can focus on producing power for the province.
According to a report presented to the meeting, the utility is worth about 9 million dollars and Bruce Power is prepared to provide 300 thousand dollars seed money for future repairs.
The bylaw to purchase will come before Kincardine council later this summer.
