Jordan Lake
I love newspapers and news blogs. I love reporters. I used to be a reporter. I come from 150 years of men – and one grandmother, Cyrene Bakke Dear – who published local community newspapers from Jersey City to Sedalia, Mo.
In the '60s my mom and dad got a lot of late-night, threatening calls from the Klan in my hometown of Elizabeth City, NC for what my dad did through the Daily Advance. David Dear informed the community with courage. He was also an equal opportunity employer before the phrase existed and he got threats for that, too.
I miss reporters. We need reporters here in Orange County. And everywhere. But you know that.
What you may not know is that something really big just happened here, something that may grow in significance for our community for the rest of the century.
And you probably have not heard a thing about it.
[At the March 1, 2011,
meeting of the Carrboro Board of Aldermen, in response to a request from
the OWASA Board of Directors to facilitate greater access to water from
Jordan Lake, Mayor Mark Chilton made the following remarks. The Editors of OP asked if we could publish his comments here as a blog post, and he agreed. -Ed.]
What the evidence that was just laid out before you clearly shows is that our community is capable of living with the water supply we have now, that the water supply now is very substantial, is scheduled to grow significantly in 2035, and that water conservation efforts have proved to be more effective than—I think they've really proved to be more effective than anybody would have guessed 10 years ago, than the most wild-eyed optimists would have believed 10 years ago. We've been more successful than that. We have not even exhausted the water conservation and water efficiency technologies and policies and procedures that even possibly could be implemented within our community.
Via the Town via my neighborhood listserve:
When the Carrboro Board of Aldermen voted on March 1 against a request by OWASA to amend the Water and Sewer Management, Planning and Boundary Agreement (WSMPBA) -- and the Chapel Hill Town Council
followed suit on April 25 -- the local water and sewer utility found itself in need of a compromise or a new strategy.
Despite serious misgivings among some local officials, OWASA is moving forward on discussions with the City of Durham, Chatham County, Orange County, and other neighboring jurisdictions to secure future access to Jordan Lake water.
There is a lot of pressure from Chatham County because they over-built beyond their capacity to provide water during the high growth heyday of the Bunky Morgan era. OWASA is a valuable ally to these other jurisdictions because it owns a prime piece of land on the west shore of Jordan Lake that is ideal for a water intake.
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