For the past 22 years, Black Hills Energy has been reading the water meters for Newton WaterWorks. That will change next year, however, as Black Hills has said it can no longer read the WaterWorks meters. That means Newton is now looking for some alternatives.

L.D. Palmer, Newton WaterWorks director, said there are a couple of technologies available for reading meters, including towers which would collect information from the meters, or by driving vehicles through the neighborhoods.

A long-term solution would probably involve changing out the old meters over a 10-year period as they become outdated, changing out 3,000 to 4, 000 meters over a five-year period.