Agenda - 11-18-2014 - 6a - Laserfiche WebLink

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on 1 Pam Hemminger said this discussion is very technical in nature. She said this is still 2 being graded as a group project, so that is why all of this centers on the information in the lake. 3 She said the jurisdictional loading was for staff benefit, and to help with modeling. She said 4 work is being done with the state agencies, which are all on board with the monitoring project. 5 She said the funding has been cut back so much that the state is only monitoring 6 quarterly. She said there is no way to reach the proposed reductions, and staff believes the 7 calculations were incorrect to begin with. 8 Pam Hemminger said the state agencies will only look at a group report, and this is why 9 it is important to work with the watershed group. She said there is still one spot open on the 10 Upper Neuse River Basin Association (UNRBA) board, and it would be good to have a third 11 name from this jurisdiction. She said there are representatives from the agricultural board, the 12 Environmental Protection Agency, and other state agencies, so there are conversations 13 happening. 14 Chair Jacobs asked if the positions filled by other entities are filled with staff or with 15 elected officials and public representatives. 16 Pam said this varies, and most have at least one elected official, though there is a lot of 17 staff presence. 18 Chair Jacobs said a few years ago the County sent a letter objecting to the way the 19 standards were formulated because of the way the County already protects watersheds, and 20 because of the impact on agricultural practices. He asked how this has been incorporated in 21 the group's formulations. 22 Pam said the Department of Water Resources did not accept any protective measures 23 that Counties had already put into place. She said this puts Orange County at a disadvantage 24 due to the large amount of forested land in the basin, which makes it hard to reduce nutrient 25 loading. She said the other problem with the formula is that there were flaws on the 26 calculations. She said she and Tom Davis have fought for jurisdictional measuring, but it is 27 hard to break out from the Hillsborough jurisdiction. She said as a group they need to know 28 where the nutrients are coming from. 29 Commissioner Price asked about the rationale for the noted jurisdictional sample 30 locations marked with white x's. 31 Tom Davis said the x's are at the jurisdictional boundaries of the creeks and streams in 32 the County. 33 Dave Stancil said this is because of the mandate to calculate each jurisdictional loading 34 rate. 35 Commissioner Rich asked about the future ramifications of Orange County not meeting 36 the nitrogen and phosphorous load. She asked about the financial responsibilities of Orange 37 County as it relates to the dues. 38 Pam Hemminger said the dues are to pay for the nutrient tool box of credits that the 39 consultants were hired to develop. She said the benefit is that these will be established for the 40 County. She said the largest part of the dues is the monitoring, which is a cost of several 41 million dollars over four or five years. She said this is calculated by a very strategic formula that 42 takes into account the land mass size and the population. 43 Pam Hemminger said monitoring is very expensive, and the County would pay a lot 44 more than the current charge to do its own monitoring. She said the County will be charged no 45 matter what if this group project fails. She said the hope is that the project does not fail, and 46 that there will be reduced numbers from the new modeling that the County might actually be 47 able to meet. She said everyone is learning from each other through this process. She said 48 the dues were bumped up, but this year was less because it was a partial year. She said the 49 dues will be higher next year.