As work kicks off on the installation of sanitary sewers in Hart Highlands, affected residents are still left with questions about what they're getting for the money.
On Monday night, subdivision homeowners packed council chambers at city hall to hear council discuss their concerns.
A public meeting held Tuesday night - the first of biweekly meetings while the work goes on - was meant to answer some of the residents' questions.
Chief among the concerns is what exactly the neighbourhood is getting for the price, said Kevin Brown.
"No one seems concerned about what the homeowners are facing as the city prepares to install a sanitary sewer system into an existing neighbourhood," Brown wrote in a letter to the city also signed by neighbours Dave and Liz Dunsdon and Lee and Joanne Grohs.
The city is installing roughly 1.6 kilometres of new sanitary sewer main along Berwick and Dundee Drives, Wallace Crescent, Wallace Place and part of Langley Crescent, connecting 100 properties to the city services.
The roughly $2.4 million project is to be funded through a local area service tax (LAS), attached to the affected property owners bills.
During the council meeting Monday night, operations director Bill Gaal gave an overview of the history of the project and the stream of communication between the city and the neighbourhood.
"There has been a constant stream of phone calls and emails since the beginning of 2013 between staff and residents. Considerable staff time has been devoted to answering resident questions and going forward we will be holding public meetings with residents every two weeks and distributing a weekly update to residents," said Gaal. "The level of concern that's been raised has certainly caught me a little off guard."
But the last public meeting with residents was held back in October, said Brown, leaving questions that have cropped up going unanswered.
"We don't understand how the project budget's put together, how the project's going to be done, why we didn't go to tender, how come there's no grants - all the questions we've been asking we just haven't had the opportunity to ask directly to administrative staff," Brown said prior to Tuesday night's meeting. "Had we had that opportunity, I'll just say we wouldn't be where we are today. But we get to do that [Tuesday night]."
