The Town of Claresholm, Alberta will upgrade its water treatment facility with help from a $349,003 provincial grant. Livingstone-Macleod MLA Chelsae Petrovic handed the cheque to Mayor Brad Schlossberger at a public event on July 3, 2026.
The money comes from the Alberta Municipal Water/Wastewater Partnership, a long-running program that helps rural communities pay for essential water and sewer projects. Town officials say the upgrades are needed to keep the treatment plant running reliably for Claresholm’s roughly 3,900 residents and local businesses.
Claresholm gets its drinking water from Pine Coulee Reservoir, located about 16 kilometres northwest of town. The town’s water system can process up to 8,840 cubic metres per day, though it typically produces around 2,500 cubic metres daily. Recent dry years have put pressure on the water supply: by June 2025 the reservoir had fallen to only 43 per cent full, prompting the town to ask residents to cut back on water use.
This is not the first time Claresholm has leaned on provincial grants for water plant work. In 2023, council approved a Numatics G3 upgrade valued at roughly $140,000, with about $64,000 covered by a similar grant. The new funding will allow the town to tackle further improvements without loading the full cost onto local ratepayers. The 2026 interim capital budget, approved at nearly $4.5 million, already prioritizes water and sewer upkeep as the town confronts aging pipes and rising construction prices.
While the province has not released details on exactly what the $349,003 will buy, the investment signals continued government support for water security in southern Alberta. In March 2024 the province set aside $125 million over five years for a Drought and Flood Protection Program, acknowledging the strain that dry weather has placed on communities that depend on reservoirs like Pine Coulee.
