WRANGELL — In a special meeting of the City and Borough Assembly on March 15, members finally moved ahead toward replacing Wrangell’s water treatment plant.

The outdated plant has had a number of production problems over the years, starting not long after its construction in 1999. Reliant on a combination of ozonation, roughing and slow-sand filtration before disinfection, high sedimentation from its two water reservoirs has made treatment a time consuming, inefficient process.

Poor filter performance has subsequently been impacting water quality and water costs, as well as falling behind elev...