A few Moose Jaw-area communities were included last week when the federal and provincial governments announced grants through the Clean Water and Wastewater Fund. 

Craik received the biggest chunk of change - $1.4 million for a new water treatment plant - but two other local areas were also included. 

The village of Avonlea received $337,500 to put towards an upgrade to their water treatment plant, while the town of Central Butte gets $78,750 for a water well upgrade. 

"With the funding we're going to improve the filtration at our plant," said Avonlea mayor Marlin Stevens. "We have a pretty good plant but we struggle with treating the surface water..after the treatment it creates some microbes.  The (new) system..we've tested it and it improves the water source quite a bit.  We've been waiting two years for this (funding) and it's going to provide a much better water source for our community."

In Central Butte, they'll use their money to install "pitless adapters" on the water well head, according to Central Butte's Chief Administration Officer Kyle Van Den Bosch, who said "they'll help make maintenance easier because you're not going into a big pit..you'll now be at ground level. It'll also make it so that there's no chance that any surface water could get near where our pumps are that supply the drinking water.  It's another safeguard to make sure our drinking water isn't contaminated."

Each of the communities to receive funding is responsible for 25% of the respective project costs, with the federal government picking up 50% and the province the other 25%.