Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: TUESDAY, July 18, 1995 TAG: 9507180086
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: A-8 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: VIRGINIA BEACH LENGTH: Medium
In legal papers filed last week, North Carolina officials argued that Virginia Beach, which has been seeking the 76-mile pipeline for more than a dozen years, is no longer growing as fast as it was and that the city has learned to become frugal with water.
North Carolina also contends that the southeast Virginia region has adequate water if the localities in the region share their supplies.
Virginia Beach officials took issue with the claims.
Thomas M. Leahy III, the Virginia Beach project manager for the Lake Gaston pipeline, said every state and federal agency that has considered the issue concluded that the water is needed.
Leahy also said North Carolina overestimated the region's water supply and underestimated demand.
On July 7, the staff of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission released an environmental study that favored the pipeline project. The commission is expected to decide July 26 whether to grant a permit that would allow construction of an intake facility at the lake, which straddles the Virginia-North Carolina border.
The FERC permit is the last regulatory hurdle in the long-standing dispute. But after recent negotiations between the city and North Carolina failed to reach a settlement, North Carolina Gov. James Hunt threatened to return to court to fight the project.
According to North Carolina's latest argument, the pipeline might have made sense in the 1980s when Virginia Beach was one of the fastest-growing cities in the country and then-President Reagan was planning to nearly double the size of the Navy fleet.
But the end of the Cold War and its resulting military cuts have slowed the area's population growth, North Carolina contends in its response to the FERC study.
``Development of smaller incremental water sources as they are needed would be far more economical'' than the pipeline's projected 60 million gallons of water a day, said John Morris, director of North Carolina's division of water resources.
``I understand their argument,'' said Virginia Beach City Manager James K. Spore. ``I don't agree with it.''
Without a reliable water supply, he and Leahy said, the city will lose growth prospects to its neighbors, and shortages could create health risks.
``If we never want to grow, and we never have a drought ... and we never get another military job, then they're right on the money,'' Spore said.
``But I don't think that's what's going to happen, and I don't think that's what we want to achieve,'' he said.
Memo: NOTE: Shorter version ran in Metro edition.