Agenda - 10-21-2014-13 (3) - Laserfiche WebLink

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INFORMATION ITEM PLANNING & INSPECTIONS DEPARTMENT Craig N. Benedict, AICP, Director Current Planning 131 W. Margaret Lane (919) 245 -2575 �� Suite 201 (919) 644 -3002 (FAX) ORANGE COUNTY P. O. Box 8181 www.orangecountync.gov NORTH CAROLINA Hillsborough, NC 27278 _ 06 MEMORANDUM TO: Board of County Commissioners Bonnie Hammersley, County Manager FROM: Craig Benedict, Planning Director Kevin Lindley, Staff Engineer DATE: October 21, 2014 SUBJECT: Information Item — Temporary Voluntary Revised Lake Orange Release Protocol BACKGROUND: The County owns and operates Lake Orange, a water supply reservoir located on the East Fork of the Eno River in the northwest portion of the County. Releases from the lake are proscribed by the Eno River Voluntary Capacity Use Agreement (Agreement), which was signed in the late 1980s by the Town of Hillsborough, Orange - Alamance Water System (OAWS), Piedmont Minerals, and the County. The Agreement relates the amount of water released from Lake Orange to the level of the lake itself. According to the Agreement, the lower the water level at Lake Orange, the less water may be taken from the Eno River by the other signatories to the Agreement. Water released from Lake Orange is also intended to supply a minimum in- stream flow at the United State Geological Service (USGS) flow gage on the Eno River in Hillsborough. The amount of in- stream flow required per the Agreement is also dependent on the level of the water in Lake Orange. When the West Fork Eno Reservoir (WFER) was constructed in 2002, the Agreement was modified to include a minimum release of 1.0 cfs from the WFER in addition to the releases already described for Lake Orange. Over the last several years, a group of citizens living around Lake Orange, the Friends of Lake Orange, has been concerned about the level to which the lake drops during the hot, dry portion of the year. They have asked Hillsborough to release more water from the WFER to so that the water level in Lake Orange could be preserved, especially during the portion of the year when the lake is used the most for recreation.