December 21, 2006
RALEIGH—A group of 40 civic leaders and elected officials from the upper Catawba River basin flew to Raleigh on Wednesday to address legislators and regulatory managers on changes they believe necessary in North Carolina’s 1993 law which determines how Inter-Basin Transfers (IBTs) are granted within the state.
Other than the legislators and regulators themselves, 14 public speakers addressed changes they wanted to see. Only one, Concord mayor Scott Padgett, spoke in favor of the proposed 36-million-gallons-per-day IBT that Cabarrus County towns want from the Catawba. All the others opposed provisions of the current law.
Leaders on both sides of the issue agreed that “the process has as lot of room for improvement,” but they disagreed sharply whether the current Concord/Kannapolis proposal should be included in any changes that might be passed by the 2007 General Assembly.
Dennis A. Benfield of Hudson, the only speaker from Caldwell County, called the law “unwieldy” and “awkward” and reminded the legislative study committee that IBTs approved under the measure “don’t go into effect for 30 years,” meaning that “the generation that really feels the pressure of this legislation are our children and grand-children. Who’s here to speak for them?”
“Most of the ‘political generation’ represented here in this room, arguing vehemently for and against this law will be dead when the effects of IBTs are actually felt. What kind of law is it that requires a 30-year minimum planning period for IBTs, and then locks in those regulatory decisions permanently, ignoring future advances in science and technology that might offer better solutions?”
“In their zeal to remove ‘politics’ from the process,” said the newly elected member of the Caldwell Soil & Water Conservation District Board of Supervisors, “I’m afraid your colleagues also removed the ‘common sense.’ The General Assembly needs to revisit this statute immediately, this time remembering which generation is really affected.”
Benfield held up his personal 20-year-old copy of the U.S. Constitution, asking the legislators if they remembered the Preamble’s “promise to secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity? Or the Fifth Amendment’s guarantee that no one will be deprived of life, liberty or property without due process of law? Where’s the Due Process in these deliberations for the unborn generation?”
He said the Caldwell Soil & Water Conservation supervisors are “on record supporting (Hickory) Mayor (Rudy) Wright and other elected leaders of counties and municipalities in the upper Catawba River basin who are standing up to this proposed IBT with a promise to take any approval to court.”
The Caldwell County portion of the delegation included some 10 citizens, political leaders, business leaders and government employees.
The legislative study committee included Rep. Phillip Frye (R-Avery/Caldwell), Rep. Ray Warren (D-Alexander/Catawba), Sen. Austin Allran (R-Catawba) and Sen. Jim Jacumin (R-Burke/Caldwell).
An attorney representing the upper Catawba basin local governments, Charles Case of Raleigh, pointed out that “to take away from one area which uses water to opt for a different lifestyle is just wrong.”
Case urged the legislators to “let the free market system work—let economic development go naturally to the water it needs—don’t create artificial ‘water economics.’” He said “IBTs that don’t have the approval of the area where the water is being taken from should never be approved.”
Case handed out a four-page summary of dozens of changes he recommends in the 1993 law, including several already acknowledged as needed by chairman David Moreau of the N.C. Environmental Management Commission, which is charged with implementing provisions of the current law.
This is the group that must decide on Jan. 11, 2007, the merits of the Concord and Kannapolis request. Duke Energies, which manages the Catawba River lakes and dams under a 100-year state charter, has already recommended that the 36-million-gallons-per-day request be denied. The NCEMC itself is recommending lowering the request to 10 million gallons per day, starting in 2035.
Three speakers from South Carolina pleaded for inclusion into North Carolina’s IBT process, suggesting a “bi-state compact” and promising litigation if a regional approach is ignored again by the legislature.
Afterwards, Mayor Wright of Hickory said simply, “well, we’ve been heard. We don’t expect any more news until Jan. 11. We’ve seen the recommendation significantly reduced. If they decide to go with that, the hard part for the upper Catawba communities will be deciding whether or not to actually go to court. We’ve got three years to do that.”
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