MARSHALL — Marshall still isn’t meeting its goals for reducing salt levels in the Redwood River, city staff said this week. However, the city is hoping grant funding from the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency will help residents adjust or replace their water softeners.

The engineering firm of Bolton & Menk has been awarded MPCA grant funding for chloride reduction, said Marshall City Engineer Jason Anderson.

“They’re going to work with the cities of Worthington and Marshall,” Anderson said. “The dollars would likely go to some sort of rebate program for water softener adjustment, there may be some rebates for softener replacement if you have a very old or outdated model.”

At Tuesday’s Marshall City Council meeting, council members approved an agreement for the grant funding, including a roughly $31,000 local match.

The council also heard an update on the amount of chlorides — which mostly come from water softener salt — being released into the river from the Marshall wastewater treatment plant.

“As far as the chloride levels go, we’ve settled down,” said Marshall wastewater superintendent Scott Truedson. The levels haven’t gone down as much as they need to in order for the city to meet new wastewater standards, he said. “I’ve been calling around to local businesses … talking to businesses about, have they set their softeners down? That’s ongoing.”

Over the past couple of years, Marshall Municipal Utilities completed a more than $11.5 million project at the city water plant to pre-soften municipal water, using soda ash and lime. The project’s goal is to cut down on the amount of water softener salt households and businesses need to use, because that salt ends up in city wastewater and the Redwood River.

In November, city staff said Marshall had an opportunity to apply for an MPCA Chloride Reduction Grant through Bolton & Menk, Anderson said. Council members gave their approval to go through with the grant application.

Bolton & Menk has been awarded $250,000 chloride reduction grant that will be split between the cities of Worthington and Marshall, Anderson said. The grant requires a 25% match, which comes to $31,250 from each city.

Anderson said Marshall Municipal Utilities has agreed to split the local match costs with the Marshall wastewater department.

According to a proposed cost outline from Bolton & Menk, Marshall would receive $100,000 to invest into a rebate program or other incentives to cut back on salt in the city’s wastewater. The rebate program could potentially help Marshall residents cover the cost of adjusting their water softeners or replacing outdated water softeners.

“We have to work out the formalities of the program yet,” Anderson said. City staff plan to meet with Bolton & Menk and representatives from the city of Worthington next week.