THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Thursday, June 8, 1995 TAG: 9506080001
SECTION: FRONT PAGE: A10 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Another View
SOURCE: By W. W. ``TED'' BENNETT JR.
LENGTH: Long : 101 lines
It would be easy to dismiss Southside Virginia's resistance to the Lake Gaston pipeline as a case of country folks' stubborn defiance of their city cousins' insatiable demands. But like most simple explanations, it would be way off the mark.
For Southside Virginians, the pipeline dispute isn't about who ``owns'' the water. It's about jobs. And fairness.
Southside Virginia isn't just cornfields and tobacco rows. The Roanoke River Basin is home to more than 700,000 people and more than 23 percent of Virginia's manufacturing jobs.
Many of those jobs are in highly water-dependent industries such as textiles and furniture. The Roanoke River system (basically the Dan and Staunton and Roanoke rivers and their tributaries) feeds the Buggs Island and Lake Gaston reservoirs and is the primary source of water for our region's industrial base.
There are in excess of 82,000 manufacturing jobs in the region, with plants owned by Fortune 500 companies, national firms and firms from Japan, Germany, Sweden, the Pacific rim and many other areas. Total annual wages exceed $4.6 billion.
Under the agreement negotiated last month by Virginia Beach and North Carolina - negotiations from which Southside and Southwest Virginia were excluded - Virginia Beach and North Carolina would be entitled to siphon the first 95 million gallons of water per day from Lake Gaston, regardless of our need. Southside Virginia would get what's left, and only if it could get water permits for new industries or expansions under the new compact.
The questions raised by this agreement are serious ones:
Would a heavily water-dependent industry, such as the Motorola plant now scheduled to bring 5,000 jobs to Goochland County, make a billion-dollar investment in a water supply to which a faraway city and a neighbor state have a pre-emptive, first claim?
Would an existing industry, or one seeking to expand, have to prove its needs would not impact on Virginia Beach's or North Carolina's 95 million gallon first claim? Clearly it would. Is that fair?
Would Virginia Beach object to new water withdrawals within the basin as it did in January 1994 when South Hill applied to withdraw water via pipeline from Lake Gaston? Did Virginia Beach tip its hand here? Was that a warning shot across the bow of the Roanoke River Basin's economic future? I am afraid so.
Would North Carolina's border communities take advantage of their first claim on Dan River or Lake Gaston water when a common industrial prospect's water needs were an important criterion in its choice of location?
For example, under the compact, western North Carolina cities such as Greensboro would have the right to take up to 20 million gallons a day out of the Dan River or its tributaries above Danville, Martinsville and South Boston without the right of any Virginia community to object. This puts all of our Virginia communities within the Roanoke River Basin in a vise between western North Carolina communities and Virginia Beach and eastern North Carolina. Is that fair?
The Roanoke River Basin already lacks enough water year round to meet any large expansion needs.
For example, when Virginia Power-Old Dominion Electric Corp. needed a cooling-water supply from the Staunton River for its $1.2 billion coal-fired generating plant on the Staunton River in Halifax County, it was required to build a $10 million, 68-acre lake as a low-flow water supply. Would that project - which has provided 1,200 annual construction jobs and will provide 150 permanent jobs and an annual payroll of $16 million - be permitted under the Virginia Beach-North Carolina agreement?
In the past 10 years, Halifax County and South Boston have been able to attract more than 13 new and expanding industries representing more than $1.5 billion in capital investment. Would that have happened if Virginia Beach and North Carolina had first call on our water resources?
Was it fair to exclude the people of Southside Virginia and in the Roanoke River Basin from the process that can decide so much of our future?
Is it fair to pay off North Carolina with 35 million gallons of water daily from Southside when there has been no independent study of the impacts of or need for that additional water?
Is it fair for a compact such as this to establish a ``bi-state water advisory commission'' on the Roanoke River Basin area when no one from the basin is on the commission?
Is it fair to take 95 million gallons daily from the Roanoke River Basin to create a 35 million gallon surplus in Hampton Roads? That would occur if the compact requirement prohibiting Norfolk from selling its excess water materializes.
The current proposal will have a devastating impact on Southside Virginia from which it may never recover. Without adequate water resources, there will be no opportunity for economic development. This is more than a political issue. It is a ``life and death'' issue, and it sets a frightening precedent for other Virginia river-basin communities.
It was wrong to exclude the people of the Roanoke River Basin from the process that led to this agreement.
It is just as wrong to assume that the good people of the Roanoke River Basin begrudge water to the people of Virginia Beach as it is to assume that the people of Virginia Beach are bent on stealing our water and our future and don't care what happens to us.
We ask only that what is done be done fairly. We ask that whatever the result is to be that it be a fair one, and a fair one for all of Virginia. This agreement is not fair or good policy for Virginia. by CNB