News-Record.com

The following is a Counterpoint.

By Charles J. Jones

There are two primary reasons the availability of water supply in this area will remain marginal: Excessive bureaucracy and inter-basin transfer rules.

For example, the Piedmont Triad Regional Water Authority inherited the Randleman Reservoir from the Corps of Engineers. The reservoir and dam had received final approval for construction as a flood control and water supply reservoir. But Congress chose not to fund the project, so it was dropped by the Corps of Engineers, which gave all the preliminary engineering and other information to the Water Authority.

The reservoir then was designated as a water supply lake, the size was reduced, and Water Authority proceeded to seek approval for construction. Hoops were jumped through and state and federal bureaucratic impediments navigated for 10 years before approval for construction was received.

Millions were spent during this decade. The cost of merely getting a reservoir approved is formidable.

The inter-basin transfer rules, as they are currently interpreted, further complicate the problems of constructing a reservoir. Water from a new supply lake must be used and discharged in the same sub-basin. Often the supply water is in one sub-basin and the potential users in another. In most cases users exist in more than one sub-basin and an inter-basin transfer permit is not automatic.

Gov. Mike Easley, meanwhile, has implored North Carolina citizens to conserve water. Conservation is important but is not the ultimate answer to the supply problem.

Remove the unnecessary impediments and inter-basin transfer rules, and municipalities and governing entities will construct needed water-supply facilities on their own, as they have done in the past.

The writer lives in Jamestown.