Minutes 10-14-2014 Late - Laserfiche WebLink

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