THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Friday, March 8, 1996 TAG: 9603080566
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B1 EDITION: NORTH CAROLINA
SOURCE: BY LANE DeGREGORY, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: BUXTON LENGTH: Medium: 97 lines
Members of the Cape Hatteras Water Association have voted to turn their co-operative utility over to Dare County, Water Association Board of Directors Chairman Larry ``Bubba'' Schauer said Thursday.
Officials said the proposal was favored by 85 percent of the members who returned ballots. The ballots were mailed to 2,808 members and more than 60 percent of them responded.
``I, personally, am pleased,'' Schauer said of the members' decision. ``I honestly think this is the direction Cape Hatteras Water Association has to go to provide for the future needs of Hatteras Island. A lot of people, obviously, realized that, too.''
The next step, Dare County Water Department Supervisor Bob Oreskovich said, is for officials with the Cape Hatteras Water Association to come before the Dare County Board of Commissioners, explain the vote results and formally ask the county to take over their existing system.
``Then, the commissioners would have to vote on that,'' Oreskovich said. Elected county officials have said, informally, that they'd be glad to take over Cape Hatteras' water system.
Schauer said he didn't think the association would dissolve immediately if the county takes over the system.
``From our initial conversations,'' he said, ``I believe we'd continue running the current production plant with all of our personnel in place until the new water plant is built and running.''
Last year, water association members voted to let the county take over their system - and, with it, about $6.5 million in assets. Association officials, however, decided to let the members vote again after receiving additional information about the merger.
Drawing its groundwater from wells in Buxton Woods maritime forest, the Cape Hatteras Water Association serves homes and businesses on the southern half of Hatteras Island. Some residents in Avon, Buxton, Frisco and Hatteras Village use water from private wells on their properties. But more than half of the 5,000 parcels of land in that area are linked to the central utility.
In addition to the current Cape Hatteras water customers, 750 other landowners in those four villages have purchased water impact units - but not yet linked onto the system.
The Cape Hatteras Water Association Board of Directors has been looking for additional sources of water since 1984. But a lawsuit determined that water association officials couldn't drill any new wells in the state-protected Buxton Woods. So managers began looking for alternative sources of water production.
To meet the projected needs of all parcels of property on the southern half of Hatteras Island, Oreskovich said both the existing plant and a new reverse-osmosis water production plant are needed.
County officials have not procured a permit to discharge waste from a reverse-osmosis plant on the southern half of Hatteras Island, however. ``If we don't get a permit,'' County Manager Terry Wheeler said late last month, ``you don't get a plant.''
Cape Hatteras Water Association officials said it would be cheaper to build a plant through the county than the water association could do on its own.
Dare County Finance Director Dave Clawson said that's because county officials can get tax-exempt funds to pay for a water plant's construction and have central purchasing power for chemicals and other necessary materials.
If Dare County takes over the Cape Hatteras Water Association - and builds a new reverse-osmosis water production plant - water rates for residents of Avon, Buxton, Frisco and Hatteras Village are projected to nearly double. Cape Hatteras Water Association members pay $6.90 per 1,000 gallons now. If Dare County takes over water production for those villages, water rates will rise to $7.93 per 1,000 gallons next year and to $11.13 by 2015.
If Cape Hatteras Water Association officials had decided to build their own reverse-osmosis plant, however, water rates probably would have increased almost threefold in those Outer Banks villages - to $11.13 per 1,000 gallons next year and to $17.63 per 1,000 gallons by 2015.
Repairs to Cape Hatteras' current plant, which was built in 1967 and produces 2 million gallons daily, are projected to cost about $3.5 million. Building a new 1 million gallon reverse-osmosis plant for south Hatteras Island is expected to cost $7.5 million.
Reverse-osmosis plants purify underground water drawn from deep wells by removing 99 percent of the salt, minerals and other contaminants. Residents of Nags Head, Kill Devil Hills, Kitty Hawk, Southern Shores, Duck and Colington Island already have access to centrally produced R-O water.
Next week, meters will begin being installed for 821 homes and businesses in Rodanthe, Waves and Salvo that are getting hooked onto the county's newest $6.5 million reverse-osmosis plant on the northern end of Hatteras Island. Residents in those areas had to pay $1,500 per parcel to link into the new system. They will be charged $5.66 per 1,000 gallons of water.
In other business Thursday, members of the Cape Hatteras Water Association Board of Directors nominated former water board member Jim Carolan of Frisco to serve the remaining two years of former water board member Lou Browning's term.
Browning resigned from the water board Feb. 27 - the day after water association officials held a public question and answer session about whether the county should take over their production system.
Browning cited ``deliberate misrepresentations made by a senior water board member and legal counsel'' and ``displeasure with the county's financial picture'' as reasons for his resignation. by CNB