Agenda - 07-23-1986 - Laserfiche WebLink

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r U"- ORANGE COUNTY BOARD OF COMMISSIONERS Action A enda ACTION AGENDA ITEM ABSTRACT Item No. l Meeting Date: JULY 23, 1986 SUBJECT: An Ordinance Providing for the Conservation of Water During a Water Shortage, Restricting the Use of Water and Water With- drawals, and Allocating Augmented Streamflow from Reservoirs. DEPARTMENT: COUNTY MANAGER PUBLIC HEARING: Yes No ATTACHMENT(S) : INFORMATION CONTACT: MANAGER'S ORDINANCE OFFICE,X501 TELEPHONE NUMBER: Hillsborough - 732-8181 Chapel Hill - 968-4501 Mebane - 227-2031 Durham - 688-7331 PURPOSE: To consider adopting the ordinance upon the second reading. NEED: General welfare and public interest require that the stored water resources of Orange County be managed in such a manner as to provide optimum public benefit, subject to reasonable regulation in order to conserve this resource for the longest duration during a severe drought condition. The proposed ordinance seeks to accomplish this. It esta- blishes successive stages of conservation restrictions (volun- tary, mandatory, severe, stringent, rationing) for the public to follow as conditions warrant. It also establishes for the first time a drought management plan for withdrawals and instream flow releases on the Upper Eno River Basin. Impor- tant features include: 1. Instream flow release as recommended by the State--start- ing at the 7Q10 rate and scaling back to 0 as lower lake levels are reached. 2. Water transfer from Graham and Mebane subject to the approval of those jurisdiction to a formal request and subject to acceptable cost sharing arrangements being agreed to by Hillsborough and Orange Alamance. IMPACT: Rainfall is so far below normal as to cause the conservation I portion of the ordinance have to be placed into effect prior to the end of July.