Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: MONDAY, April 25, 1994 TAG: 9404250055
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: JAN VERTEFEUILLE STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Long
Farms, boaters, industries, municipalities, residents all use the Roanoke River and often contribute to polluting it. Everything from decomposing leaves left on the riverbank by homeowners to businesses storing chemicals underground can affect water quality.
A proposal being considered now by all seven jurisdictions along the river aims to protect water quality and make regulations along the river more uniform.
The Roanoke River Corridor Study has been in progress for seven years; in coming weeks, the counties and cities along the riverbanks will begin considering what parts of the study's proposals they may want to adopt as their own.
"The efforts of all the jurisdictions coming together is outstanding," said Bob Halstead of the Smith Mountain Lake Association. "When you're talking about soil erosion [and other problems], there really are no political boundaries."
Different areas have different reasons for looking at their regulations along the river.
In Montgomery County, where the river begins, the Planning Commission and Board of Supervisors will hear a presentation about the study today. What happens there will affect every other community downstream. "We need to be a part of this," Planning Director Joe Powers said.
Powers said the county may approach the issue primarily through voluntary suggestions for agricultural uses. The river corridor is mostly agricultural in Montgomery; farm runoff trickles into it, and cows use it for drinking.
As the river heads through Roanoke and Salem, the riverbanks hold more industries. The zoning suggestions for industry include minimum setbacks from the river and no underground storage of petroleum or chemicals.
"Obviously, we have a variety of land uses," said Jeff Burdett, Bedford County community development planner. "We wanted to do something to allow jurisdictions to tailor something for their own specific areas."
Burdett has been part of the river study since 1989. He said the committee came up with a "menu" of planning and zoning suggestions that jurisdictions can choose from to best meet their areas' needs. No county or city is obliged to take any of the suggestions, but the goal is to have somewhat uniform regulations along the Roanoke River.
"We hope it's implemented 100 percent," said Bill Tanger, chairman of Friends of the Roanoke River. "It's something that is absolutely the minimum that should be supported by all jurisdictions."
Some areas may have been concerned in the past that if they passed stricter controls on their own, they'd be at a competitive disadvantage when wooing industry.
But in Roanoke County, at least, that's not the case, said Planning Director Terry Harrington.
"Although I'd like to have all the jurisdictions adopt something, I'll be perfectly happy if only we do, because we'll be a leader," Harrington told the Planning Commission last week as it began looking at the study.
The Roanoke River Corridor Study's suggestions are actually twofold:
Having jurisdictions create conservation overlay zones along the river that would "lie" over the zoning already in place along the river. How wide those zones are and what would be allowed in them would be up to each locality.
Creating a joint advisory board for the area that would serve as an advocate for the river and would advise governing bodies on issues affecting the river corridor. This group would include an official and a citizen from each jurisdiction: Montgomery County, Roanoke County, Roanoke, Salem, Vinton, Bedford County and Franklin County.
Helen Smythers of the Fifth Planning District Commission, one of four planning districts that worked on the corridor study, said the idea is to reduce "nonpoint source pollution," any pollution that doesn't flow into the river directly from a pipe. Among other sources, this includes runoff from farms, residential fertilizer and urban runoff where there's no vegetative buffer to absorb pollutants.
If counties decide to draft overlay zones, suggestions from which they can choose include vegetative buffers to filter runoff, agricultural buffer areas, minimum setbacks for structures along the river, erosion and sediment control and land-use restrictions.
The idea first came about as a joint planning project between Roanoke and Roanoke County and expanded to include everyone between the headwaters and the lake.
Downstream, the counties that surround Smith Mountain Lake - where the river and anything dumped into it empty - hope their fellow planning commissions act on the zoning proposals. The lake is not only a major tourist and residential area, but also a potential source of drinking water for both Bedford and Franklin counties.
"Protecting the quality of the water coming into the lake is of primary importance because it's a major draw for this area," Burdett said.
Bedford County already has a conservation overlay zone along the Roanoke River, added when the county revised its zoning ordinance two years ago. The district was modeled after the one in the study's preliminary review. But it's much less detailed than the most recently proposed one.
Franklin County will hear a presentation on the study in May. That county has very little frontage on the river, and most of it is woodland. But being downstream of the rest of the counties, Franklin sees the proposal as an important one to protect the lake.
Two professors from Ferrum College, who have monitored the water quality at Smith Mountain Lake since 1985, found a dramatic decrease in water quality in the past two years. It's the beginning of a trend they want to reverse quickly.
"It's impossible to attribute it to any single source," said David Johnson, professor of chemistry and environmental science. "No one wants to point to one group, especially when they're trying to do consensus-building to preserve the quality of the lake."
Two culprits are heavy use of fertilizer by homeowners and farming without adequate buffers between crops and the river. Overlay zones passed by all jurisdictions along the river are critical, he said. "How can you have decent protection of a large watershed that crosses many political boundaries if you don't get a . . . coherent plan in place?"
Such a plan will benefit more than just the lake, Johnson said.
"Water pollution in Smith Mountain Lake is soil loss in Montgomery County," he said. "So what you've got is a valuable resource being misplaced."
Tanger, with Friends of the Roanoke River, said his group wishes the recommendations went further, "but we're realistic about it."
by CNB