City Council Meeting   9/20/2010

I'd like to call this meeting to order.

Dr. Brown?

Ms. Everett?

Here.

Mr. Norris?

Here.

Mr. Huja?

Thank you all for joining us here tonight.

We do have some open seats scattered around the room for those of you who are standing if you would like to sit.

We're going to start with a couple of proclamations and awards and I first want to read a proclamation relating to Domestic Violence Awareness Month.

I believe we have some friends here, Robin, from the Shelter for Health and Emergency.

Whereas violence against women, children and men continues to become more prevalent as a societal problem, and whereas the problems of domestic violence are not confined to any group or groups of people across all economic, racial and societal barriers, and are supported by societal indifference,

Whereas the crime of domestic violence violates an individual's privacy, dignity, security and humanity due to systemic use of physical, emotional, sexual, psychological and economic control and or abuse, with the impact of this crime being wide ranging.

Whereas it is victims of domestic violence themselves who have been in the forefront of efforts to bring peace and equality to the home.

Whereas no one person, organization, agency or community can eliminate domestic violence on their own.

We must work together to educate our entire population about what can be done to prevent such violence, support victims and survivors and their families, and increase support for agencies providing services to those community members.

And whereas the Shelter for Health and Emergency has been a leader in the City of Charlottesville in combating domestic violence by providing 24-hour hotline services to victims and survivors and their families, offering support and information

and empowering survivors to try their own course for healing whereas the shelter for help in emergency commemorates its 31st year providing unparalleled services to women, children and men who have been victimized by domestic violence.

Now therefore be it resolved in recognition of the important work being done by the shelter for help in emergency.

that I, Dave Norris, Mayor of the City of Charlottesville, do hereby proclaim the month of October 2010 as Domestic Violence Awareness Month and urge all citizens to actively participate in the scheduled activities and programs sponsored by the Shelter for Help and Emergency and work towards the elimination of personal and institutional violence against women, children and men.

Thank you.

I'd just like to thank the city for recognizing this next month as Domestic Violence Awareness Month.

I'd also like to say that in addition to what's on the proclamation, we also offer emergency services in the form of shelter to women and children.

In addition to all the community, we offer free counseling and legal advocacy to anyone experiencing domestic violence.

I'd also like to invite everyone to come to our silent vigil, which is going to take place October 4th.

at Jackson Park, and also the brown bag lunches that are taking place all the Wednesdays in October at our outreach facility from 12 to 1.

Thank you.

What time is it?

When is the vigil?

October.

Thank you.

Next we have two awards that were recently bestowed on our Department of Parks and Recreation.

We're very proud of our Parks and Recreation staff for these awards and I'm going to briefly summarize these two awards.

The Virginia Recreation and Parks Society Awards on an annual basis.

a couple of different recognitions and we received two of these awards this year.

One was for best promotional effort in electronic media.

This is for the Meadow Creek Golf Course website.

This was a fun, creative new website that creates awareness and encourages people of all ages to get involved at Meadow Creek and in the first T program here in Charlottesville.

In the first three months after its launch, the website recorded over 5,600 visits.

It's a very interactive site.

We want to congratulate Will Bassett, our business and marketing manager, and Ryan Summers, director of golf for the hard work, and congratulations on that award.

And secondly, our Parks and Recreation Department received Best New Special Event Award from the Virginia Recreation and Parks Society for the Kid Float, which is a combined effort of Charlottesville Parks and Recreation and the Float Fishermen of Virginia.

It's a day of canoeing, paddling, swimming, and fun on the James River,

for lower income and at risk children in the city of Charlottesville, particularly for kids who have never experienced canoeing, never been out on the river.

It's a wonderful program, 35 children ages 7 to 14 year old participated this year.

The majority of the youth came from public housing sites here in the city.

Thanks to Parks and Recreation program manager Erica Sims for her hard work to make this program a reality.

and congratulations for winning this award.

And I don't know who, Brian Daley and I don't know, Erica is here to receive both of these awards.

Just to share, this is for the previous year and this is our fourth year.

We had it in June and we had 43 kids sign up so it keeps increasing and I greatly enjoy it and I have a good time.

I just want to congratulate Erica.

This program was her brainchild.

She put it together and to be honored this way is just great.

We'll now move forward to announcements.

I have a couple announcements that I know a couple of counselors have a couple things to add.

Government Services Day will be October 14th from 10 a.m. until 2 p.m. downtown.

If you've ever been, it's a fun time.

The biggest fair

ever, the biggest government services fair ever this year.

Again, October 14th, it's a Thursday from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. and many of our city departments will have exhibits downtown.

You can get a tour of city council chambers.

You can watch the police SWAT team in action.

Watch, visit the fire department.

Not an actual raid.

Visit the fire department demonstrations to stay safe with fire, not a real fire.

Take the passport tour with giveaways, etc., etc.

It's a wonderful time, so please join us for that.

Once again, I want to announce the city is looking for the perfect Christmas tree.

I guess we're supposed to say holiday tree, sorry.

The city's looking for the perfect holiday tree.

The tree should be an evergreen under 25 feet tall and have easy access for removal.

And if you have a tree that you'd like to donate,

We will come and pick it up, obviously at no charge to you.

The phone number to call is 970-3129.

And lastly, the budget office has revamped their website for any of you budget hawks in the audience or at home, charleshill.org slash budget.

Yes.

The second of our Council Around Town series will be next Thursday, September 30th at the Mary Williams Community Center on East Market Street.

We're inviting people to come and speak to the City Council.

We'll all be there.

It's really a listening session, so we want people to come and have things to say.

We'll also invite you to bring your kids and your appetite.

Dinner will be served and there will be fun supervised activities for kids.

It's a great opportunity to talk with city council and city staff about the issues important to you.

So that's next Thursday, September 30th.

Thank you Ms. Szakos.

Any other announcements?

Okay, we're going to now move forward to matters by the public.

I just want to make sure everybody knows who's here to speak on the water supply issue.

If you did not get a chance to sign up on the public hearing, you will still be allowed to speak, so don't worry about that.

We will have matters by the public now, and again, we want to keep these

Anybody who wants to speak on the water supply needs to speak during that public hearing.

So this is for non-water supply topics.

And there actually are some, believe it or not.

The first person who signed up to speak, and again, when you come forward, give your name and keep your comments to three minutes and give us your address.

Mr. Mayor, honored members of the City Council, good evening.

I am David Cattell Gordon, 827 Reiner Road here in Charlottesville.

I'm the director of telemedicine at the university, but most importantly I come before you tonight because I am the father of Daniel.

a beautiful kid, but a kid who is severely disabled with autism who is blessed to be a student at Virginia Institute of Autism's VIA school I appreciate the opportunity, it is a water issue of sorts to address the problem of the sinkholes at VIA and water issues there

Imagine, if you would, what this hearing would be like tonight and what you would be hearing at City Council if at the track at Charlottesville High School, falling into a sinkhole such that students stop exercising, black night sporting events were canceled, and more importantly, kids were at risk.

Imagine if that sinkhole opened at my old alma mater, Burnley Moran, and kids stopped playing tag at recess.

They stopped their physical exercise.

There would be a loud outcry.

Would there not?

Letters, phone calls, a lot of pressure to get this fixed and the city would be acting immediately.

But imagine a kid who does not have any language.

A child who has no sense, and I mean no sense, of their own personal safety in this environment.

A child who, because of their autism, has taken years just to learn to tie their shoes, put on their shirt, use the potty, let alone exercise or ride a bike.

Imagine if this sinkhole appeared in a tract at this kid who had literally taken years to begin to learn to ride that bike.

if it opened up, and so he stopped riding.

All this learning, years, every step of it falling into a hole.

Well, as you guys know, this has happened at VIA with a sinkhole caused by the breakage of a 30-year-old municipal stormwater pipe, and these do these kids not deserve the same as every kid within this community.

So it's time for us to act, and each of you knows

The Time to Learn is short and very precious for a child with a disability.

So I appeal to you.

These are your students, our kids.

They are part of an educational program supported by local dollars in our community.

And the sinkhole

and the surrounding drainage issues needs to be fixed immediately is it poses a learning issue for our kid, but more importantly, it poses health and safety risk every day.

and importantly the city needs to own this project.

This should not be a cost share situation.

Dollars directed from the Virginia Institute of Autism are dollars that are being used to educate the kids every day.

There is not a well of resource there.

It is a small but valuable resource to some of our community's most vulnerable citizens.

So I appeal to you.

to fix this hole in our children's learning and in their health.

Thank you.

Mr. Mayor, honored members of the Council, my name is John Baddiston.

I'm at 2490 Wiltshire Close in Keswick, Virginia.

I'm speaking on behalf of the proposal to mitigate the sinkholes at the Virginia Institute of Autism.

I'm currently the president of the board of directors, a position I assumed a couple of months ago.

Prior to that, I was the vice president of the board of directors and also acting interim executive director for six months.

One of my other function was chair of the building and grounds committee for two years.

But foremost, I am the grandfather of a nine year old little girl with autism who started VIA in 2003 when she was just turning three.

The advances that she has made since 2003 are immense and almost due in their entirety to the work of people of VIA.

The issue of the sinkhole has been going on for over two years and I am intimately familiar with all that has transpired.

And I'm not here to point fingers or assign responsibility, but I am here to respectfully ask

The council approved the fixing of this major safety problem that puts at risk not only the children at the school, but also the children in the neighborhood who frequently utilize the school grounds after hours.

As interim director, I had to make a tough decision to dismiss a child from VIA who continued to endanger himself by jumping the safety fence and then into the sinkholes.

On one occasion, it took a number of instructors to get him out of the sinkhole.

This is a child who is 18 years old, very, very strong, and is a City of Charlottesville resident who is no longer at VIA because of the safety problem.

The one issue is fixing the sinkhole, which I hope will be done quickly and without delay.

The other issue is who will pay for the relocation of the storm drainage system.

I urge you to consider the fact that VIA is an extension of the city county school system.

We serve children who the public schools are unable to serve.

Our tuition does not cover our operating costs and only through the generous giving of donors are we able to meet all our obligations.

If we are to force to take money out of the operating budget to pay for any portion of the drainage construction, then those funds will be diverted from the education of the children who need it the most.

I ask you to consider the fact that

If this problem existed on city school, as David was saying, how long would it have taken for sinkholes to be fixed and who would have paid?

VIA is no different.

Yes, we serve other students than the city of Charlottesville, but we were the few schools in the state to be able to handle the types of children that are currently enrolled.

If the children do not go to VIA, then the cost to the city would be much higher.

And in the long run, the city would wind up paying more than the cost of what is proposed for VIA to pay the repairs.

Consider this, who will protect these children?

Hi, I'm Paige Engle.

I live at 108 Elkhorn Road in Johnson Village in the city of Charlottesville.

I'm here to talk about the Cinquil at VIA.

I'm honored members of city council.

I'm a resident.

I've been in Charlottesville for 10 years and I have two children at Charlottesville city schools.

My youngest was diagnosed with autism when he was two and a half and has spent five years at Venable Elementary.

This last year a joint decision between Charlottesville city schools and myself was made to remove him from a city school situation because he was unable to participate fully and there was not an appropriate setting for him.

We were lucky that we have a resource in Charlottesville for him which is the Virginia Institute of Autism.

The responsibility for his education and his success rests both with VIA and the Charlottesville City Schools, and myself and the team who works with him views VIA as an extension of his Charlottesville City School experience.

If you haven't already, I urge you to visit VIA.

Look at the sinkhole for yourself.

The pipes that are deteriorating primarily serve an adjacent residential city neighborhood, and the sinkhole's continuing to grow.

Currently, part of the school track is blocked.

And for children who have autism, it is incredibly important for them to have sensory input like biking, running, jumping, anything that would help to facilitate communication, to calm them, to motivate them.

And additionally, many of our kids have language deficits, which makes a hazardous situation like the sinkhole even more dangerous.

As was said before, I can't imagine if this was at Venable Elementary that it would have continued on as long as it has.

As a city resident, I feel like we should all be proud that we have a school such as VIA here in Charlottesville that provides significant support to a growing population.

Please let VIA focus staff time and resources in educating children with special needs, not fixing a sinkhole problem.

Please resolve the issue quickly and at no cost to VIA.

Thank you.

Mr. Mayor, honorary members of the council, my name is Ethan Long.

I'm the executive director of the Virginia Institute of Autism.

I'm also a resident at 101 Kelsey Court in Charlottesville, Virginia here.

Basically, I don't think I could say anything more powerful than what our parents have just expressed to you.

but I have dedicated my career to teaching students with autism and I can tell you that given the disability, the fact that our students have difficulties with receptive language and the fact that we have 8 to 10 feet sinkholes present on the property, there is a significant safety concern.

I started it via an April and one of the first issues that I wanted to look to address was fixing of the sinkhole because clearly it inhibits our children's learning

It is truly a safety issue and I ask that you do please do the right thing here and help us get this fixed so that we can get back to the task of serving our children.

As was mentioned, we are a non-profit organization.

We serve city students who come to us.

We are an extension of the public school's classrooms and we use our evidence-based methodologies to help serve those students that have the most difficulties in learning.

Asking us to cost share in this project will substantially impact our ability to use our resources to better serve the students that we're serving currently.

Thank you for considering this.

Thank you.

Good evening.

I'm here tonight representing 400 Altamont Street.

I'm here tonight representing the North Downtown Residence Association.

This year our annual event is being held at The Haven.

We will be having several guests on topics that we feel will be of interest to residents of North Downtown.

Keke Dymack will speak on The Haven and its services.

Police Officer Harvey Finkel will speak on downtown security issues.

And Realtor Lindsay Milby will do an update on downtown real estate and how to challenge your assessment.

and our own Collette Hall will speak on recent activities of North Downtown Residence Association.

We would like to invite all city council members and our acting city manager to the event, as well as all residents of North Downtown.

This meeting will be held on Sunday afternoon, the 26th, this coming Sunday from 2 to 4 p.m. at The Haven at First and Marcus Street.

A reception with refreshments will follow the speakers.

We handed out a lot of flyers to the neighborhood.

If someone did not receive a flyer, they are welcome to go to our website, which is very easy to remember, northdowntown.org.

Thank you.

Hello, Stratton Salitas, 704 Grave Street.

and pretty shortly

Probably, pretty shortly anyway, Charlottesville is going to get a draft of the memorandum of agreement for the mitigation of damage to historical properties if the McIntyre Road extended is built.

And that is, of course, the part of the parkway that is proposed to go through the McIntyre Park.

and so this is a request that council specifically take a take responsibility for that and make sure that as in the past where

Sometimes these important things have been handled by staff without an open vote on council or perhaps even consultation that there is actually an opportunity for the public to see what council's position on this is.

And this is a very important issue, I think, because right now, as you know, the Corps of Engineers has not yet given a permit to VDOT

based on the fact that there is no logical terminus, there's no endpoint to the road that VDOT proposes.

The myth that has been propelling this project forward is that the road and the federally funded interchange are separate projects.

but of course they end in a field without the other so it's important that that not get signed until at least that assumption has been tested in court and I believe that that is going to be coming soon because we do not want for sure a half road built in the park and then have the interchange money taken away with no means of connecting the road

and in fact we wouldn't want the road without the interchange either because even VDOT's own studies show that the road without an interchange would immediately double the weight on the Route 250 bypass and just in general I hope that council will

work towards a more walking, biking, and transit friendly community.

The difference between that kind of community and an auto-centered community has huge implications on health, our air and water quality, the relations between wealthier and less wealthier people.

And if we do this road, I think the debate will shift to it being four-laned,

immediately, and also the 250 bypass being widened.

And that will be the new debate instead of doing a lot more walking, biking, and transit.

Thank you very much.

That's the last person who signed up to speak for matters by the public.

Is there anybody else who would like to speak on non-water supply issues?

All right, thank you very much.

Any council member responses to matters by the public?

Yes.

And I did go by there this morning.

Anything else?

I, too, fully support taking care of that problem.

So, I mean, we will have a broader discussion, but get comfortable.

Okay, we are now going to move on to our consent agenda.

We have a number of items on our consent agenda tonight.

Item A is a minute to September 7th.

Item B is an appropriation of $509,036, an appropriation of FY 2011 Jaunt pass-through, second of two readings.

Item C is an appropriation of $18,000, 2011 Department of Motor Vehicles Virginia Highway Safety Grant, second of two readings.

Item B in appropriation, $48,390, 2010 Edward Byrne Memorial Justice Assistant Grant, first of two readings.

Item E in appropriation, $135,398, BJA Drug Court Discretionary Grant Program Award, first of two readings.

Item F in appropriation, $4,385, Insurance Reimbursement for Storm Damage Repairs to Gas Building,

on 29 North, first of two readings.

Item G in appropriation, $1,540, U.S. Department of Justice, overtime reimbursement for the Charlottesville Gun Violence Task Force, first of two readings.

Item H, a resolution and initiation of individually protected property for Jefferson School, first of one reading.

Item I is an ordinance petition to rezone property to 233 4th Street Northwest, otherwise known as the Jefferson School, second of two readings.

Item J, an ordinance proposed amendment for street displays on the downtown mall, second of two readings.

Item K, an ordinance change to snow ordinance, first of two readings.

And item L is a resolution transfer of downtown project cost, first of one reading.

Is there a second?

Second.

Any further discussion?

If not, please indicate your vote.

and I believe it carries unanimously.

I can't actually see it.

All right, now we have the main event.

This is a public hearing and a resolution regarding our community water supply plan.

This is potentially before us tonight on the first of one reading.

Mr. Mayor, Members of Council, I want to briefly present for the public the slides that we had at your work session.

This is a 2006 50-year community water supply plan.

These are capital costs only, consisting of the new Ragged Mountain Dam, the south-forth to Ragged Mountain Reservoir pipeline,

Dates in parentheses were approximately when Rivanna anticipated those projects would be built.

The upgrade to the observatory water treatment plant and replacing rehabbing the Ragged Mountain Reservoir to observatory transmission system and future water plant expansions.

Since that time, you and the Rivanna board have asked for a number of studies.

We had Schnabel do their report and they came back with a recommendation for an earthen dam rather than a concrete dam if you choose to build a new dam.

We had HDR's dredging feasibility study which gave you recommendations on a phase one and a phase two possible dredging scenarios.

The Ragged Mountain Dam feasibility, this was a city-funded study that

by Black & Veatch that said that it is feasible to build on the existing dam should you choose to do that at a variety of heights up to 45 feet.

We also had the Schwartz Demand Analysis Study, which was funded by Rivanna, which basically verified the demand analysis from earlier studies.

And the I-64 embankment

which talked about some recommendations of preventive things that could be done if you raise the dam to the point that it impacts the I-64 embankment.

And I think you've been through those.

So this is the adjusted 50-year community water supply plan.

Again, capital costs only.

The dam, the pipeline.

The dam cost is Schnabel's estimated range that includes construction, final design, construction, engineering, the mitigation plan and the I-64.

Embankment.

Services that preceded the final design that have already been completed and paid were not included because of not future obligations.

The pipeline observatory upgrade, the Ragged Mountain Reservoir to Observatory Transmission System, and again the future water plant expansions.

This is the adjusted 2006 Black & Veatch

This is building on the existing dam and again the other, the pipeline, the upgrade, the transmission system and the future plant expansions stay the same.

So that's pretty much what we presented to you at your work session.

Any questions for Ms. Mueller before we open the public hearing?

Thank you very much, Ms. Mueller.

We have quite a few, as you might expect, quite a few people who signed up to speak at the public hearing.

And again, if you didn't get a chance to sign up, you will be able to speak at the end of the public hearing.

When you come forward, please, again, state your name and address.

And we are going to have to keep a pretty close watch on the time limit.

So you have three minutes.

And I'm going to have to cut you off, because we do have so many people that have signed up to speak, just so we can keep things moving.

And if you want to allow yourself one hearty round of applause after the first time you hear somebody you really appreciate.

But let's not applaud after every single speaker, because then we'll be here till midnight.

I think that's it.

We are going to start the public hearing.

Good evening, Mayor and City Council.

My name is Martha Levering.

I'm at 712 Grove Avenue.

I represent the League of Women Voters and I'm going to read a letter that was written in 2009.

The League of Women Voters of Charlottesville and Albemarle County have been advocates for watershed protection for more than 25 years and active participants in water supply planning throughout the design period.

Based on our accumulated knowledge, we remain steadfast in our support of the implementation of the permitted

50 year water supply plan approved by the RWSA, the city, the county and the Albemarle County Service Authority.

This sustainable plan should improve the health of our watershed by protecting flows in two major rivers.

The size of the new Ragon Mountain Reservoir is designed to meet estimated human demand in the year 2055 while meeting in-stream flow requirements of the South Fork Rivanna River below the South Fork Rivanna Dam.

The plan also recognizes the inadequate water transfer capacity of the Mormon's River water intake, thereby requiring that the Sugar Hollow Pipeline be decommissioned.

A new pipeline from the South Fork Rivanna Reservoir to Ragga Mountain Reservoir will be built in its stead, taking advantage of the abundant flow in the South Fork Rivanna.

This important system design change will end the decades-long competition between the urban demand for water and the environmental needs of the Mormon's River.

The cost of this plan will be less than any other viable alternative presented, in part because it incorporates replacement slash rehabilitation of aged infrastructure, such as the Ragon Mountain Dam, the Observatory Hill Water Treatment Plant, century-old water distribution pipes, and as mentioned previously, the replacement of the old and brittle Sugar Hollow Pipeline.

The plan also leaves the community with stronger tree canopy and streams than we have today.

Although it necessitates the removal of many acres of trees at Ragga Mountain Reservoir, the long-range plan provides in compensation 200 acres of young native trees and miles of protected and rebuilt stream sides.

Another advantage is that the plan deals creatively with the sediment flowing into the South Fork Rivanna Reservoir.

It facilitates the settling out of sediment

before sending the clear water to Ragged Mountain Reservoir, a reservoir that is not subject to sediment accumulation because of its topography.

The South Ripper Valley River will continue to supply our community with its drinking water and thus giving us a local water source.

Impressive public participation was instrumental in leading to this excellent outcome that the entire community can be proud to embrace.

This is what we knew in 2009 and is what we know now.

No new information has been presented to change our position.

Thank you, Ms. Levy.

Hello.

I'm Linda Goodling, 740 Meacham's West Drive, Charlottesville.

I am on the board of the League of Women Voters and Ivory Creek Foundation, but I must make a point that I'm speaking

just personally tonight.

I urge City Council to re-approve the 2006 Water Supply Plan.

It remains the most economical and environmentally sound choice.

The South Fork Reservoir is seven and a half miles long and drains 260 square miles of the county.

It's a great place to collect water, but because it also collects lots of sediment, it is not a good place for storing the water.

The Ragon Mountain Reservoir sits in a natural bowl with a small protected watershed.

It's an efficient, effective place to store water so that connecting the two reservoirs with the pipeline just makes sense.

It will also restore the health of the Rivanna and Mormons River.

The dredging base plan will cost $26 million more than the current plan even before adding the unknown cost of future mandatory dredging.

The DEQ has shown that the alternative plan of judging not only falls short of providing long-term water needs but has environmental consequences which would render the permitting process difficult since it does not meet stream flow requirements.

Over half of the cost of the water plan is for the replacement of old failing infrastructure.

We have neglected to replace cracked brittle pipes and repair the compromised Ragged Mountain Dam.

The DCR has been concerned that the dam may fail if we have another hurricane.

Time and again, reports show that the cost of either dam project is lower than the initial dredging, not to mention the mandatory required dredging over and over again.

Additionally, with the new Ragon Mountain Dam, the community will get more acres of lake surface for recreation and fishing close to town with improved public access.

The Nature Conservancy, the Piedmont Environmental Council, the League of Women Voters, the Charlottesville Chamber of Commerce, the Free Enterprise Forum, and many others have endorsed this approved plan.

And now City Council wants to start over.

Why?

Thank you.

The next person to speak is Oliver Kuttner.

Congratulations, sir.

Thank you, sir.

That was a good feeling.

Drove my VLC accurate about 130 miles per gallon today, am I right?

I tell you, I've learned an awful lot.

And one of the things I've learned is that hardened feelings must go away.

I can see two sides to this.

whatever decision we make as a society must be a good one and people must forgive the other sides and I personally see the new dam as feature creep and I've become very very aware of feature creep through looking at the automobile.

You know a lot of us want four-wheel drive in our cars and the truth is when it snows we don't get in the cars and for some people that's absolutely essential to have four-wheel drive but for most it's not.

If we

Adjust our water supply to the possible absolute need, peak need.

We're spending a lot of money and yes we have the situation where we have water in that really hot summer but maybe as a society it's time to start to change course and I really feel that is happening in our world.

Building things to peak use is wasteful.

Maintenance is a really good idea.

I was the crew coach from 83 to 84.

I coached the women at UVA and the freshmen in each of the years, one each.

And it was evident then that the reservoir was going to soak up.

The course we could read became shorter.

And maintenance really works well.

I really believe that we need to dredge first.

You know, try it, do a good job with it.

The other thing I'd like to point out is at one point I owned a Pegasus dealership on Pentos Mountain.

We were happily on a well.

Albemarle County came to us and said, you have to hook up to a public water supply.

And we said, why?

We don't want to.

Well, the water's going to be better if we supply it.

So we ended up having our water tested.

And our water was better than theirs.

They still made us hook up, which we did.

And then we got a monthly water bill.

And now look at the city.

We're out of water for those river pipes.

Maybe we should look at conserving other ways.

Wells work wonders when they're connected to septic fields some feet away.

You keep the groundwater level more or less the same.

I am not in favor of hundred million dollar projects in 2010 and beyond because I think our country is becoming a poor country if we don't pay attention.

I myself am now quite a wealthy man and I own a lot of real estate and I promise you I wish I owned less.

Future Creep has a way of creeping into all our lives.

Today I wish I had more time for my kids, more time for my cars and less time for the 180 tenants I have and I really like my tenants.

The city is about to get themselves more infrastructure which they may live to regret in some years down the road.

Mr. Huja, I'd like to also say thank you to you.

In many ways, you're a very positive encouragement when this car guy named Oliver started to build buildings.

I had no intention of going into the real estate business, but this man over here encouraged me and said, go ahead, you'll do a good job.

I did a good job.

I enjoyed it.

I still do.

And in many ways, it's the foundation of my wealth which led me to the car.

Today I had several emails with Mr. Pope, who's the CEO of the Sierra Club.

We may very well change the world.

We really may very well do it.

Thank you, Mr. Huja.

We both love this country.

It's been good to us.

Hi, I'm Lucy Bird Pago, Rugby Road City, and I approve of the 2006 Water Plan for a number of reasons, and I'll give you two.

Right now, we are having a severe drought

Charlottesville is definitely a fire hazard.

I would like to think that if a fire breaks out, as it did in California, that we had vast reserves of water to call upon if we need it.

That could be accomplished in this way.

If the excess water which goes over the spillway

at the South Fork Reservoir were pumped to the Ragged Mountain Reservoir which has large capacity for storage but does not have a large watershed.

That would give us additional water to call upon.

That's the first thing.

I think that in that case we would need to have enhanced the dams of both the South Fork Reservoir and the Ragged Mountain Reservoir and that would definitely be one of the priorities for our expenditures.

Lastly, I think dredging is a good idea provided the cause for dredging is addressed.

Siltation occurs in these reservoirs.

Therefore we must cut down on the siltation or dredging will continue endlessly.

To cut down on siltation we need to

cut down on stream erosion, stream bank erosion of the feeder streams to our reservoirs.

And I think that any program for dredging should be accompanied by an aggressive program for controlling the siltation.

And that's not in the water plan, but I think it should be added to address the

stream erosion and the bank erosion and other causes for siltation and then dredging would make sense.

Thank you.

Bill Kittrell, 1781 Whitehall Road.

First thing I have to do, of course, is say hello to my six-year-old daughter who's watching at home if it's not past her bedtime.

possibly.

So Mr. Mayor, members of City Council, thank you very much for all that you're doing in considering this and especially for tonight.

There are moments in our lives with our families and with our community when healing is the way forward.

We need your leadership to help our community come to the right decision and begin its healing tonight.

The lengthy process to develop our water supply plan has brought difficult moments to our community and the debate over the plan has created adversaries out of friends.

When there should have been agreement there's been acrimony and in some cases very personal attacks have been made and this has disappointed me greatly.

But you have the opportunity tonight to end the acrimony and put this community on a pathway to healing.

That is what leadership can do.

A vote to do dredging of the South Fork Reservoir opportunistically when and if it makes financial sense is a great way forward and is exactly what the South Fork Stewardship Task Force recommended and is what the Nature Conservancy supports as well.

A vote for the approved plan moves our community towards healing while also allowing our rivers to heal as well.

Sadly, I've heard and read several recent discussions about the environmental issues of the alternatives, but I hear nothing about the importance of healing one of our most treasured assets, the Rivanna and its tributaries, and the preservation of some of our most imperiled species, the aquatic wildlife that depend on the Rivanna.

and just as sadly our foremothers and our forefathers did not understand the ways that they affected those dreams, but now we know better.

I encourage you to act on that better understanding and to not repeat the oversights and mistakes of our past.

This process and the journey to develop our water supply plan has been enlightening, it's been frustrating, it's been challenging, it's been complex and confusing, but most of all it's been fractious.

Hippocrates said that healing is a matter of time, but it is also sometimes a matter of opportunity.

You have that opportunity tonight.

Thank you.

Mark.

Good evening again, Mark Cabot, 400 Altamont Street.

Several years ago, when this matter was up before city council, I made a comment that good times were going to end.

I was referring to the economic prosperity that we were experiencing and unfortunately we did go into a recession.

Fortunately, Charlottesville has been not hurt as badly as other parts of the country.

I do believe that we're going to have unfortunately many years of slow economic growth.

We can implement a 50-year water supply plan in stages, even treat it as needed.

The advantage of this is that there will be a larger number of people to share in the course.

Keeping this in mind, I urge you all to dredge first and let's implement it in stages.

Thank you, Mr. Kelly.

Hi, my name is Liz Palmer, 2958 Meacham Banks Drive, and tonight you'll hear a lot of very well-meaning citizens talk about the approved plan and tell you that it's not the best option.

They'll say that it's not the least environmentally, excuse me, they'll say it's the least environmentally sensitive choice

yet you have professionals on the staff of the Southern Environmental Law Center, PEC, Piedmont Environmental Council and the Nature Conservancy like Bill Cottrell who just spoke who tell you that they have reviewed this plan and it's the most environmentally sensitive option we have and that it actually improves the health of our rivers.

You'll also be told that we're planning for too much water but yet we are planning for less water per capita than any other Virginia community.

You'll also be told that we can't possibly afford it, but yet Rivanna says that they won't have to increase the wholesale rates because they, and I might add the ACSA, have been planning for this for years.

You may even be told some things like what I got off of the Seville Water website last night that will be destroying three city-owned reservoirs, but I'm sure you don't believe that.

Please don't be dissuaded by a small group of people who are very, very well organized.

Please decide tonight to support our community's future needs, protect our waterways, and re-approve the plan that you approved in 2006 and 2008.

Mayor Norris, City Councilors, I'm Jim Nix, I live at 2402 Cary Lane in the city.

I've spoken to you on a number of occasions in support of the community water supply plan, focusing mainly on environmental issues and cost comparisons among the alternatives.

You've heard my concerns about the need to restore natural stream flows in the Rivanna and Mormon's rivers.

You've also heard me highlight the cost advantages, as determined by the studies you've directed, for enlarging the reservoir in Ragged Mountain as opposed to committing to continuous dredging of the Rivanna reservoir.

Now instead of repeating these arguments tonight, I'd like to address an important component of this issue not often discussed in this forum, and that is city-county cooperation.

Albemarle County and the City of Charlottesville form one community and if we lived in any other state, Charlottesville would be part of Albemarle County.

But we don't live in another state and we must deal with the vexing problems that result from our unnatural division into two mutually exclusive jurisdictions.

We have been dealing with some of these problems for a very long time and solutions to a number of them are not yet on the horizon.

Things like roads and parkways and traffic and dare I mention it, revenue sharing.

But the community water supply plan is an example of an important city-county issue for which a solution is at hand that clearly benefits both jurisdictions.

The agreement between city and county

County reached in 2006 and reaffirmed by this council in June of 2008 clearly benefits both and should not be a source of conflict.

If this plan is adopted, the city and the county will both get an ample water supply that will protect us from shortages even in times of drought for at least the next 50 years.

Crumbling infrastructure will be replaced ensuring more reliable water delivery to all who depend on it.

with adequate water supply, assured economic growth, providing jobs for both city and county residents can occur.

And lastly, for the first time, we will be providing water for our citizens without damaging the health of our largest river and one of its major tributaries.

It was in recognition of these advantages that both the county board of supervisors and the city council unanimously approved the community water supply plan in 2006.

None of this has just changed.

There have been many studies and endless discussions, but the fundamentals remain the same.

This water plan is a powerful example of something that the city and the county can do together for their mutual benefit.

We have enough issues to divide us, but this is an issue on which city and county can agree.

I beg of you to avoid taking any action tonight that would destroy this mutually beneficial agreement and turn it into yet another bitter conflict between city and county.

If you can't achieve a majority in favor of confirming the plan you have already twice confirmed, then please limit your changes to those that are likely to be acceptable to Albemarle County and to the permitting authorities and the Virginia Department of Environmental Quality.

Thank you.

I'm Joe Mooney.

I live at 201 Sunset Avenue in the city, and I'm a Rivanna water supply rate payer.

I think that's important.

Mr. Mayor, council members, first of all, I do want to thank you for the three or four years of attention that you've given to this issue.

It would have been so easy to simply approve this, to never have a public hearing, and to just let it go.

Your curiosity and I think your determination to do the right thing has carried us over the years to this point.

The statement that there is nothing new is simply patently incorrect.

We now know that dredging is not going to cost 140 to 240 million dollars.

It looks more like 35 to 40 million.

That is new, relevant information that must be taken into account in our thinking.

First, the issue of common sense.

The RWSA water plan first caught my attention four years ago when I learned we would be replacing our three gravity-fed reservoirs with one reservoir behind a very large new dam at Dragon Mountain.

It would be fed by pumping water through a new nine-mile uphill pipeline rising 320 feet over its length.

The enlarged reservoir would extend directly under Interstate Highway 64, and the cost was estimated at $142 million.

This did not sound like common sense to me, and so I got involved and have been since.

What I'd like to do is to ask people, if they're willing, to get a hold of one of these sheets, and there are some people who can pass them out.

This data is in front of you and what I'd ask you to do is to start with the Page multi-colored on the top.

And the reason I call it to your attention is because it contains what I think is the most succinct summary of the data that you've been asking for from RWSA and from Mr. O'Connell for several years and which I don't think you've ever received.

So, I think this deserves a great deal of attention.

Okay, why?

When I asked Edie Smith what she was working on about a week ago, she told me that she was working on a data matrix.

She gave it to me and the black and white side, which is the other side of the color, has all the data on it.

I looked at it and my mind went numb.

I have number anxiety as I think many others do.

and in trying to understand it, I realized that it was really important to know what the data means.

We're talking about hundreds of millions of dollars.

So, I forced myself to sit and look at it and overcame about a half an hour of anxiety and hopeless, I can't understand this stuff.

Can you wrap it up soon?

Okay.

The red side are the numbers that are questionable.

The green side are the numbers that I think have been confirmed.

Thank you.

Thank you Mr. Mooney.

Mr. Mayor and Members of Council, my name is Francis Fife and I live at 501 9th Street, SW. And I want to join with the others who say that you all have worked hard on this.

I hope that you come to the right conclusion, which would be the same as mine.

I think we owe you thanks for putting out the effort that you have.

I'm a former chairman of the Rivanna Water and Sewer Authority.

I'm not sure what that's worth, but anyway.

I'm a member of the Citizens for a Sustainable Water Supply Plan.

And I'll have to say that I've lived in Charlottesville all of my life and I've never seen a group of citizens work as hard

to develop a solution to any civic problem before, trying to check all the figures that seem to be flying around and some of them absolutely conflict enormously.

It's amazing.

They have studied all of the available information and consulted with local, state, national authorities and experts.

In the three minutes allotted, it would be impossible to more than allude

to the many reasons for my opposition to the building of a new dam at Ragged Mountain and my favoring dredging the South Rivanna Reservoir.

In 2006, RWSA adopted a new plan, which by the way superseded one already adopted in 2002, so plans do change.

The new plan called for the construction of a new dam at Ragged Mountain

as well as the virtual abandonment of the Sugar Harbor and Rivanna Reservoirs.

Among my reasons is a high cost of building a new dam and the unknown cost of building and operating a pipeline to feed the Ragged Mountain Reservoir.

I know you've seen figures, but I think those figures really need to be checked.

It is folly to abandon two working reservoirs.

It would be risky to rely upon one reservoir to serve the area now served by three.

Just think about that.

The clear cutting of 180 acres of beautiful forest at Ragged Mountain, along with the destruction of habitat for wildlife, which would be required if the 40 foot dam is built, is shameful.

I am in favor of dredging the Rivanna Reservoir to restore its full capacity to serve as the main water source.

Okay.

The next figure was $144 million and then $225 million, all with regard to that one thing.

A later consultant produced a number 30 and 40 million.

Tim Holbert.

Mr. Mayor, my name is Timothy Holbert.

I live at 2246 Brandywine Drive.

I want to welcome you to the neighborhood.

I work for the Charlottesville Regional Chamber of Commerce, which unlike me is 97 years old this year.

And we represent private enterprise.

The city is a member also.

We have 100 nonprofit organizations that are members.

We promote business and we work for the quality of life of what we refer to as greater Charlottesville communities.

At the center of that is the city of Charlottesville, the number one city in America.

This is in my mind and in somebody else's, other people's mind.

We support, after a number of years, supported the approved plan by the authorities and the city council and Albemarle County Board of Supervisors.

We supported it when it was adjusted.

It seems reasonable.

It is not perfect.

I don't know that anyone's invented the perfect plan yet, but it is reasonable.

It enjoys the support of environmental organizations that from time to time we find ourselves in disagreement, most notably the Piedmont Environmental Council, the Southern Environmental Law Council, and our beloved Nature Conservancy.

Along with that, this plan enjoys the support of the League of Women Voters, the Free Enterprise Forum, and of course our Chamber of Commerce.

Without getting into the weeds again, because we've been in there for a few years, I know you have, and we think that this plan, we are pretty confident that this plan provides the clean, safe, reliable, affordable water supply for this community

for us, for our children and our grandchildren going forward and at the same time is the least environmentally intrusive plan that has been proposed.

It enjoys the fact that it is permitted

which means it can move forward, is permitted by DEQ, the Department of Environmental Quality, by the Federal Environmental Protection Agency, and I suspect the Army Corps of Engineers, which is another subject we'll do another day.

So we would urge the City Council to stand fast and reaffirm its previous support of the City Council in this plan.

And I am confident, unlike Bill, that my 15-year-old daughter is not

remotely close to the television set to watch me say these words.

Mr. Mayor, Members of Council, I am Richard Statman.

I reside at 116 O'Linda, Charlottesville, Virginia, and I do pay a water bill through my lease that I rent an apartment.

The city is made up of many people with many interests.

Some of us you see often, but few become involved in city affairs.

There are people like myself who go to work each day here in Charlottesville, raise our families and pay our taxes.

We assume that you will work in our best interests.

I have always believed that our elected officials hold the public trust, the public trust for all the people.

I have read and listened with interest about the Rivanna water project and I am concerned.

Decisions that our public officials make have an impact on our children and even their children.

This certainly is one of them.

The recent black and beach study shows the Ragon Mountain Dam in question is in good condition except for the spillway.

I strongly believe dredging should begin immediately.

This is common sense.

I am terribly concerned that any RWSA project may destroy our city's reservoirs and all the nature around them.

Fix the Ragon Mountain Spillway.

The dam is fine.

It does not seem that we need all that new water.

We certainly don't need more debt and more spending until it's clearly necessary, and now it is not.

I think the City Council has a legal

and fiduciary responsibility to the public in that matter.

I am concerned that decisions that affect all the people be much more transparent.

This is one of them.

I'm concerned that people never elected in rooms of Charlottesville Tomorrow and apparently the Nature Conservancy are determining my future water needs.

Every public official has a privilege and responsibility to serve all the people.

Mr. Mayor and City Council, thank you for the opportunity to speak to you today.

I want to suggest to you that because we live in a world of limited resources, it's always prudent to propose self-imposed limits on our actions.

It's good to be prudent and economical and frugal and conservative, if you will.

And good to know that just because something can be done that never means carte blanche that it should be.

By way of metaphor, I would like to submit that simple solutions are often preferable to complex ones.

Assume this three-gallon bucket is two-thirds full of sand.

But I need three gallons to fulfill my needs.

So I could hire an engineer to design an extension to the top about six inches.

It would have to be of the right material.

And I'd have to change the handle.

I'd have to reconfigure that.

I'd have to support a lot more weight.

and then I find that it's too heavy and too large, too bulky for me to lift into my sink anymore.

So I may have to hire an engineer to design a pump to get the water in and to get the water out again.

And then, of course, I'd have to finance this.

So, you know, and after having it built and installed, I check my credit card and, lo and behold, it's already maxed out and at a usurious rate at that.

So maybe there's a simpler solution.

I don't know anyone who would not put a bucket in the shower or a pan in the sink to help themselves, their family or their community meet their water needs to flush the toilet, to wash their clothes or water their house or garden plants.

It's good to seek simple solutions that are basically to simple problems, problems that are common to humans all over the planet.

So I do know that I don't need a chainsaw to slice a pat of butter.

Ernie's a hard act to follow.

Good evening all.

I'm Audrey Dannenberg.

I live in Minor Road in the city.

I'm here tonight as the vice chairman of the Piedmont Group of the Sierra Club and speaking tonight on behalf of more than a thousand of our members who reside in this local area.

We cover the Charlottesville and Albemarle County area.

Whoever just dotted my numbers on how many members we have, I've been with the Sierra Club since 1978.

Thank you.

The Piedmont group of the Sierra Club believes that capacity restoring dredging of the South Fork-Rivanna Reservoir and water conservation programs together can provide a basis for a new water plan that will meet DEQ long-term water supply plan requirements.

At this time we see no justification for construction of a large new dam at Ragon Mountain.

Construction of this dam and the associated new pipeline from the south fork of the Rivanna River will incur large unnecessary economic and ecological costs.

The PMOC group believes that plans for construction of this new dam and pipeline should now be abandoned.

Additional information on several issues would assist in development of a better

Long-term water supply plan.

These issues include first, cost of dredging in small steps.

Second, condition of the pipeline from the Sugar Hollow Reservoir to the Ragon Mountain Reservoir.

Third, water flows required to maintain native plant and animal populations in the Mormons River.

And four, the ability of groundwater supplies to contribute to urban water supply.

We urge the City of Charlottesville, the County of Albemarle and the RWSA to examine these issues.

In this time of rising environmental crises, we all must find the vision, will and means to move toward more sustainable ways of living.

In the lengthy debate that has surrounded our long-term water supply, the City of Charlottesville has taken the lead in seeking out paths by which our water plan can be made more compatible with environmental protection.

We urge that tonight you continue to lead our community to a better, more sustainable water supply.

Thank you.

Mayor Norris, members of council, good evening.

My name is Clarence Roberts.

I'm chairman of the Albemarle County Service Authority.

and I'm speaking on behalf of the Albemarle County Service Authority tonight.

For the benefit of the public, the Albemarle County Service Authority, we are your partner in this water endeavor and we are also your partner in the current water system that we have working through the Rivanna Water and Sewer Authority.

My comments are going to be very

Short, and they're going to be very short because Friday we sent you a letter.

We ask you to read that.

We hope that you have it with you and perhaps in your meeting package and you've had the occasion to read it.

However, I want to highlight one point that was made in that letter, and the point is county growth.

will not be paid for by Charlottesville residents.

And please permit me to qualify that statement.

They think it's funny, but you all know for many years we worked together on perhaps more than, on hundreds of cost sharing projects.

The city has always paid for its water,

and Sewer Needs and this county has done the same.

Make this point because we work well together on community projects.

We work well together when developing cost-sharing agreements and we work well together when there is a community award emergency such as broken mains, etc.

The other point I want to make to you is that the Albemarle County Service Authority, we value that relationship.

That relationship has been built over many, many years by Judah Mueller, Bill Brent, the ones of you who know that Bill Brent was our former executive director of the Albemarle County Service Authority.

And he was also an employee of the city.

and I will not mention that we stowed your city manager.

Having said that, thank you for the opportunity.

You have a tremendous amount of information that you have to digest.

And as stated in our letter, we are in favor of the current 50 year water plan as submitted.

Thank you.

Mr. Mayor, members of the city council, I'm John False.

I live at 1503 Rugby Road.

As you know, I'm ambivalent about concentrating our water storage into a single primary reservoir.

But that's not going to be my topic tonight.

A key component of the proposed water plan is the construction of a new pipeline from the South Fork Reservoir to the Ragged Mountain Reservoir with an estimated cost of $62 million.

That's in the Wiley Wilson report.

I hadn't realized until tonight that's the biggest item in the whole thing.

It's much more expensive than the dam and everything else.

Yet the Wiley Wilson document is very cavalier as to where the pipeline is actually located.

It only indicates that it will be built somewhere within a rather broad potential pipeline corridor.

That's on page four.

I strongly urge you to defer any decision until the precise course of the pipeline has been publicly specified.

There should be no rush to judgment until we know what is really being proposed for this key component.

With the cost of easements, looming is a large expense, I can suggest a route that completely eliminates the cost of easements for over half the route.

The pipeline should make use of those properties already owned by the Commonwealth of Virginia, those properties shaded in orange on the three maps that I've given you,

They're free from easements.

Council should at least defer a decision until the Rivanna Water and Sewer Authority agrees that these properties will be used for the pipeline.

Thank you.

My name is Bill Emery.

I live in the city at 1604 East Market Street.

The Rivanna Water and Sewer Authority stores, treats, and transmits drinking water and wastewater for two wholesale customers, Charlottesville's Department of Public Works and Albemarle County Service Authority, RWSA, is in the water and sewer business.

The water side has been getting a lot of ink.

but a meaningful conversation about a water system requires discussion of the wastewater side as well.

Countywide from Crozet to Camelot, wastewater flows via underground infrastructure to the Moores Creek Wastewater Treatment Plant at the foot of Monticello, six-tenths of a mile from a World Heritage site.

Ideally, the volume of potable water entering the system and the volume of wastewater

treated and released back into the Rivanna River would be roughly equal.

But in reality, they're not.

We have a pronounced I&I problem, inflow and infiltration problem.

Our sanitary sewer and severe rain events struggles.

The interceptors, the large sewer pipes become overfilled, what they call surcharge.

Manhole covers blow off.

or blown off by the pressurized mixed liquid and suspended solids and untreated sewage flows directly into Morse Creek and the Rivanna.

This dire situation is reflected in RWSA's five year 2010-2015 capital improvement plan.

71% of that capital improvement plan's funds are budgeted for waste water and 29% for drinking water.

The responsibility for the I&I surge targeting issue

lives with homeowners, with Charlottesville Public Works, with ACSA and with RWSA.

The city and county are working to reduce the I and I problem, to reduce the I and I by 25% by the year 2020.

It makes little sense to fund increased potable input into our regional water system until the inflow and infiltration issue is addressed.

It's like pouring water into a broken glass.

Our future may well hold a shiny new dam.

But first we have old business to take care of, addressing the habit worked by deferred maintenance on the underground pipe.

We need to complete the repair of existing assets system-wide.

and system wide that means conservation and dredging on the input side and vigorous infiltration and inflow reduction on the wastewater side.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Ma'am, ma'am, gentlemen.

I'm Bob Fenwick, 901 East Jefferson Street.

First I'd like to say I echo Bill Cottrell's sentiments about the tone of the public discussion.

And I'd also like to say that opposition is not acrimony.

You've heard a lot of facts and seen a lot of figures, but for a moment let's step back to the basics.

The South Fork Rivanna Reservoir is city property.

Despite being almost 50 years old, it has never been dredged and we are losing not only a water resource, but a valuable recreational asset.

To maintain its value and increase available water, the Rivanna Reservoir should be dredged back to the original contours.

Rivanna Water and Sewer Authority, after years of delay, now proposes token dredging.

Just enough to get us off their backs

so they can return to what their true goal is, a new dam at Ragged Mountain.

They claim dredging is more expensive than building a new dam and a new pipeline.

Where have we heard that before?

Reservoirs in lakes and surrounding communities, Lake of the Woods, Lake Anna, Lake Monticello, have been or are being dredged.

If a new dam were cheaper than dredging,

Why did these communities not opt for a new dam instead of dredging?

The answer, of course, is that dredging is much cheaper, and it is also basic common sense.

The pro-damers are trying to embarrass you into deciding to commit hundreds of millions of our dollars for the largest public works project this community has ever seen by saying the city can't make a decision.

and all the city wants to do is delay.

Well I would say it's not embarrassing to save the taxpayers, rate payers and bond payers hundreds of millions of dollars at a minimum.

It is very easy for them to spend our money.

A gentleman stood in front of you, I believe two weeks ago, and said, to do this project the water rates will not go up.

I guess he was trying to create the impression that they can build the dam and pipeline for free.

If they have found a way to build a new dam with a new pipeline and all that goes with it for free, then one of them should be the President's next Secretary of the Treasury.

Because truly they have stumbled upon the goose that laid the golden egg.

Why waste this money in this economy when there are more pressing immediate needs?

The food bank can't wait for 30 years.

Children who are dropping out of school can't wait for 30 years.

Homeless mothers and children can't wait one year, let alone 30 years.

The dam can wait.

Dredge Now

repair the Ragged Mountain Spillway, dam later if necessary.

Good evening, Mr. Mayor, city councilors.

My name is Leslie Middleton.

I live at 1608 Oxford Road.

I work at 706 Forest Street, both in the city.

I offer these comments to you today as the Executive Director of the Rivanna River Basin Commission and in this capacity I

encourage you to recall why the River Basin Commission was created.

And that is because many in our community believe that there is value in planning on a watershed basis, not merely based on political subdivisions that have authority over only portions of the watershed

Indeed, the 2007 City Council affirmed this by agreeing to participate on the commission and since then, three of you have been or are serving on that commission.

There are good reasons for making decisions on a watershed basis.

Unlike humans, a watershed is silent about the political boundaries that we draw upon it.

Rather, it conforms to the laws of nature, which hopefully we as humans try to discern.

We do this because increasingly an end

Increasingly we see that our own health is intertwined with that of the ecological health of our river and its watershed.

We do this because we have the option of making decisions that positively affect the health of the watershed while at the same time benefiting its human population.

Watershed planning allows human beings, if they so choose, to think outside of the political subdivisions and consider the impacts of land use and water supply decisions both upstream and downstream.

Watersheds both affect and are affected by groundwater resources and so allow us to think holistically and regionally about water.

if we so choose.

There is no arguing that the city owns the reservoirs in question.

Ownership resulted from decisions made in earlier eras by elected officials such as yourselves and were based wholly on meeting the current and expected needs of a growing population.

Absent from these decisions was a consideration of maintaining the health of our headwater streams as a way to support the integrity of the entire watershed.

We now know through peer-reviewed science that river systems will only maintain their health if they are allowed to replicate some semblance of natural flow conditions.

Therefore I urge you to ask yourselves two questions as you consider this decision.

Does the plan allow for adequate in-stream beneficial uses for the Rivanna's headwater streams, specifically the Mormons River and the South Fork Rivanna?

2.

Does the plan recognize the necessity to consider water resources on a regional basis?

Not just Charlottesville's reservoir, but water that serves portions of Albemarle County.

Not just Charlottesville's water, but water that will eventually flow downstream through our neighboring county of Fluvanna.

And not just the Rivanna River that flows through Charlottesville.

but a river that flows in part from headwaters in Greene County where as we speak decisions are being made about impoundments for that county's growing population.

Mr. Mayor, City Council members, my name is Sam Freilich.

I reside at 505 Rookwood Place in Charlottesville.

Reflecting on the proposed 50-year water plan, I thought of an analogy.

Let's change the word water to school.

Imagine our being at a school board meeting.

The topic of discussion is determining the need for more schools in the future.

The time frame discussed goes from 10 to 30 and finally to 50 years out.

A couple in the audience are statisticians and explain that it's impossible to predict that far in the future.

The board disregards their comment and hires a consultant.

The consultant notes that school enrollment has declined for the past seven to eight years.

It seems that nearby communities have lower land prices so homes are more affordable and new businesses are attracted to these areas for the same reason.

However, he ignores the drop in enrollment since his client is expecting to see future demand for more schools.

The consultant draws a line upward indicating that enrollment will increase 50% over the next 50 years.

Coincidentally, although water demand has decreased by 24% from a peak demand period in 2003,

While our population has increased by 10% in the last 10 years, our latest consultant disregarded this fact and also drew a line upward with no variation to a usage target in 50 years.

Interestingly, about the same figures in the previous demand studies.

And this is the, on page A7 it shows this line just going straight up, disregarding the flat, lowered demand rates.

Back to the school.

The board is advised that construction costs are very low due to challenging economic times and can get great prices for new schools.

There are currently 30 schools in the system, so plans are drawn for 15 new schools.

And since bus manufacturers have a glut of new buses at great prices, they commit to purchase 150 of them.

To pay for this, the board incurs a $143 million bond to pay for the school construction, the buses, and for long-term maintenance.

Fast forward to 25 years later.

Now halfway to 50 years, enrollment should have increased by 25%.

The actual increase was more like 10%, and only three of the 15 new schools were occupied.

The 25-year-old buses were totally obsolete.

The money set aside for maintenance had recently been dissipated, and the board was in deep financial hole.

Just as this scenario, the 50-year water plan is irreversible.

The good news is that we can get all the water we need for the next 30 plus years by dredging the neglected South Fork Rivanna Reservoir for millions of dollars less than the proposed plan.

And different from the water plan, the dredged water is immediately usable as opposed to the water plan.

where the clear cut Ragon Mountain Reservoir will require a 7 to 12 year period before a $63 million pipeline can begin pumping water to it.

Let's dredge now and only increase the capacity of our reservoirs when and if needed.

Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor, Councillors.

My name is Jack Brown.

I live at 1505 Dairy Road in the city.

And I hope I have two minutes of remarks, not three.

It strikes me that the controversy over the water supply plan has in fact been very useful to everybody in the region.

Controversy is what has shed a lot of light on issues that were very hidden away in engineering studies or in quiet deals in closed rooms.

So controversy has been a good thing and I think we can all agree that people of good intent have been involved in this debate on both sides.

But I'd like to make one clear point.

You or we in the city are in some measure being gamed here.

RWSA chose the very beginning to go to the 50-year plan, not a 30-year plan, even though any statistician, as you've already heard today, knows that reliability plummets with projections going out so far.

RWSA, having not maintained its own infrastructure for 50 years, then said in 2006 that it was too expensive to maintain its infrastructure, so it wanted new infrastructure.

RWSA wants to start the dam at Ragged Mountain as soon as possible, but it hides its weak engineering and high cost in the pipeline, the pipeline necessary to make that new and large Ragged Mountain work.

Once the dam is underway, of course, RWSA presumes that we'll have to sign off on the pipeline needed to animate the dam and the reservoir.

The 2006 plan doesn't include accurate maintenance, electricity, or other costs associated with the new and enlarged complex infrastructure.

And now, when county leaders and RWSA has sailed for some flaws in its plan, they now admit, well, yeah, maybe we could do some dredging at Salsport.

RWS's on demand projections as you've heard today don't hold up, but they cling to them.

So I urge you all not to be gamed.

Don't accept this false choice for or against a plan.

Instead, hold on to the real asset that we have.

A call now for request proposals to dredge.

Learn the real costs and preserve that city asset.

My last remark in this connection, anybody who's looked at our reservoir in the last week knows that we're three feet down.

were starting to look very much like the bad drought we all got scared by many years ago.

Dredging will give us capacity today.

And so unlike the visionary plans, perhaps pie in the sky of RWSA, you can affect real change now by an RFP.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Gia DeAngelis, 1220 Coleman, Mr. Norris and council members.

For all the proposed plans, including the Ragged Mountain Pipeline, we need to dredge the South Fork immediately.

Once the South Fork is wetland or dry, it will be extremely difficult both financially and governmentally to refill it.

If we keep and dredge the South Fork, we will always have a backup.

We have the option to continue to use it and backup when needed.

It served us for 50 years, and we are actually using less water now.

Even for the proposed pipeline, if we go through with that, we still need to dredge.

It is not part of the current plan.

The plan is to build a culvert at the end of the dam.

and divert that water in high flow states and it will only be a few days a year.

The plan is to divert it 300 feet in elevation, 9.5 miles.

We don't have these high flow states or rarely have them now compared to 15 years ago.

I've been here 18 years.

If the South Fork is silted in or dry, the few

High flow states we do have will saturate the dry ground and the surrounding area.

It will not reach that culvert and that plan will fail.

Pictures are worth a thousand words.

I encourage you to get on the reservoir and see it.

It's not a high flow river.

It's partially wetland now.

Finally, dredging is cheap and we need something in place now so we

because we can't go back once it's dry.

Dredging is estimated, it's a binding bid, it's estimated at 30 million.

This project, and we may go through with the project, but it's estimated at 140 million.

And the cost may be grossly underestimated because the costs are shifted to the taxpayers and there's no incentive to keep those costs down.

And this is another reason to have this reservoir in place as an option.

Thank you.

Mr. Mayor, Councillors, my name is Rebecca Quinn and I live at 104 4th Street in the city and I'm a city rate payer for water.

Just because someone else will pay for most of this project doesn't still make it a good idea.

The Albemarle County Service Authority has said the county will pay for its growth

Will it also pay for improving stream flows?

It'll be interesting to watch county residents to respond as that awareness spreads.

But if there's still a chance that a big new pipeline and dam are in our future, you need to be prepared to take a stand on cost sharing.

which I believe should be based on the water that our citizens and our businesses are expected to use.

To be prepared for that and to fulfill state water planning requirements, we must update the demand analysis using current American Water Works Association methods that have been recently revised to account for conservation.

not by a shortcut percentage or a one-time step down.

We haven't heard much tonight about the state planning requirement, but it is looming.

Months ago, Rivanna stated that this new demand analysis will be updated to meet the state's November 2011 deadline.

I still don't understand why that hasn't been started unless they're concerned that the answer won't support a pipeline and a big new dam.

Making new decisions on new data is your responsibility.

To get updated facts needed for several decisions I encourage five things.

Dredge now, take the lead on the RFP, get it on the streets.

Take the lead on the new demand analysis.

Make sure that it separately identifies the city's projected demand from the county's projected demand.

In less than a year, certainly in time for the 2011 deadline, we can have a new analysis that accounts for conservation and changes in use, including UVA and Martha Jefferson.

Third, proceed to the next level

on the preliminary design for the three alternatives for the lower Ragged Mountain that were identified by Black and Veatch, including a 13-foot rise on a large enough base to go forward if the decision is we need a new dam sometime in the future.

You don't need to decide which of those three options to take right now.

We can do that when we have the results of the demand analysis.

At the same time, I believe Rivanna should suspend any further action on the Earthen Dam.

Fourth, call for an independent analysis of Sugar Hollow Pipeline and develop a real cost estimate to rehab it.

Rivanna has stated that the cost to rehab is the same as the cost to build a new uphill pipeline, $36 million, excuse me, $63 million.

That's difficult to believe without having some kind of evidence.

Doing that will also put bounds on your cost share.

Thank you.

Good evening.

I'm going to read this to you.

I am here tonight as a city resident to ask you as you decide how to proceed with the water supply plan to put the welfare of the city as your highest priority.

While the current plan may be good for the county and may be good for the nature conservancy, it is not good for the city.

The price is simply too high, which may sound odd since we haven't been told yet how much the city will have to pay.

We do know it will be some part of $143 million, but that is hardly the whole cost to city residents.

And when it's done, we won't have any more water than we have today.

not because it won't be available, rather because we won't need any more water.

In fact, the city is likely to use even less water in the future.

So for this, what are we being asked to give up besides some undisclosed amount of money?

For starters, 200 acres of mature forest in a city-owned recreational area at the Ragged Mountain Natural Area.

It is clearly the most ecologically important of our city parks.

Arguably of the county too.

But that's not all.

They also want you to agree to give up our supply of the cleanest and clearest water in the city system because they are going to cut off the pipeline that links the city to the Sugar Hollow Reservoir, which you own.

which also means we lose direct access to the 360 million gallons in the Sugar Hollow Reservoir.

So now we're going to give up some undisclosed amount of money, some 200 acres of parkland, the cleanest water in our system, and the Sugar Hollow Reservoir, but that's not the only reservoir you have to give up.

Part of the plan is also to abandon the South Fork Rivanna reservoir.

Fully half of the water at the newly expanded Ragged Mountain reservoir is needed just to make up for the loss at the South Fork.

But now I don't need to tell you either that not only is the South Fork our largest current water system, it is also a valuable recreational facility.

So now we have to give up some undisclosed amount of money, 200 acres of parkland, the cleanest water in our system, the Sugar Hollow Reservoir, and the South Fork Rivanna Reservoir.

Why would we agree to do this?

Well, they'll tell you it's this or the James, but that's simply not true.

Right now there are options that haven't even been explored that could save all these assets.

Or they may say it's too late, you already agreed to this plan.

But that doesn't hold water either.

City Council approved a different plan in 2003 that never happened.

In fact, this plan changed dramatically at the last minute, and it can change again.

You can make that happen.

Thank you.

Dee Dee Smith, November 19th, 2007.

I delivered this to you three years ago, almost three years ago.

And it is only because we're still here because you have protected city assets.

I would love to stand here and butt some of the details I've heard, but you know what?

You all know the deal.

The only question now is who, when you vote, will you represent?

Good evening Mayor Norris, City Councilors.

I'd like to make three points tonight.

First, dredging does not cost more than the damn pipeline.

Dredging supplies water for a long, long time.

And three, it's not a good idea to build something really expensive and destructive for the environment that you might not need in the distant future and which you have plenty of time to build later if you need it.

And all of my stuff is based on studies that have been performed by various consultants.

Number one, dredging does not cost more.

The simplest way to look at this is the cost of the pipeline

I had $65 million.

Ms. Mueller had $63 million.

It's fine.

We'll say $63 million.

The pipeline is essential to the concept of the 45-foot dam because the Reagan Mountain watershed is so small.

The cost of dredging is less than $65 million alone with nothing added in for the dam.

So dredging is not more expensive.

Second point, dredging supplies a lot of water for a long time.

And I'm sorry that I can't pass out graphs to everybody, but the graphs that I just handed you show that the demand, and this is using the Swartz demand, intersects the supply from dredging in the year 2055 or 45 years from now.

But let's say their estimates are off 25%.

So that would give you a range from a low of 35 years to a high of 55 years.

And to me, that's still a long time.

And in addition to that, you can get additional supply from a 13-foot addition to the Reagan Mountain Dam.

And we are losing 15 to 20 percent of our water through leaks, and fixing those leaks would also have additional supply.

My third point, it doesn't make sense to build the dam now.

And I'd like to have an analogy.

If you thought you might need a new car five years from now, would you buy it now?

Well, I wouldn't.

Why would I buy something I don't need now?

Cars five years from now will be safer and they'll get better mileage thanks to people like Mr. Kuttner.

In five years I may decide I don't need a new car.

I will have paid off my old car.

I won't have any car payments.

My taxes will be less.

My insurance will be less.

It gives me flexibility.

Five years from now I say, well gee with a brand new car it would be nice but I can get a real good deal on a nice two year old car, low mileage and that sort of thing.

And this technology multiplied by a factor of ten, it pretty much holds up to the dam.

Fifty years ago televisions were luxuries.

They were black and white and you maybe got three channels.

Thirty years ago almost nobody had personal computers.

Things that have been a constant in my entire life are going away.

Cash, checks, newspapers and landlines.

Film cameras are already gone.

The pace of technology is accelerating.

In 50 years you might have a solar powered dehumidifier sitting on your roof to produce your water or possibly a closed loop system that will recycle your water.

People 50 years ago would think that the things we have now are science fiction and we can't imagine what the world will be like 50 years from now.

So please don't build a dam now that you don't need.

Once the money is expended, you can't get it back and you can't put the trees back.

If you don't build a dam now, you can always build one later.

Thank you, Mr. Smith.

Thank you.

Good evening.

My name is Heather Rowland.

I live at 583 Rosemont Drive, Charlottesville.

I'm here to comment solely on the Schwartz water demand forecast and that's based on my 40 plus years of experience as a mathematician, a mathematical modeler and a forecaster, including 17 years as the head of the global oil group for one of the leading international energy consultancies.

So I have extensive experience of forecasting particularly oil demand in both the short and long term and very familiar with most other professional forecasts in that area.

Linear regression, the forecasting technique that was used in both the 2004 RSWA and the Schwartz study has a place in short term forecasting.

It's quite indefensible to use it for any long term projection

For long-term forecasting, it's essential to capture structural change.

To do this for, say, gasoline demand, you would model the various components of demand.

So you'd look at the changes in the fleet of cars through purchases and scrappage and how that affects miles per gallon.

You'd look at the changes in the driving age population

you'd look at the changes in commuting distance and so on and then you would recombine them to make a forecast.

Forecasting water demand is no different in principle.

One needs to model numbers of households, household use of water by task, appliance efficiency and so on.

Apparently none of this has been done.

It would be kind to describe the shorts forecast as second rate.

In my opinion, the water demand forecast is fatally flawed

and it would be irresponsible to build a water supply decision on such a shaky foundation.

And two last comments.

The Schwartz report contains two charts that fit a linear regression using a time scale that switches from a ten year time interval to a one year time interval back to a ten year time interval.

It is impossible to do that.

and secondly the Schwartz proof that there is no change in the long-term trend in water usage post 2003 is a case of garbage in garbage out.

All their so-called proof shows is that if you don't model the underlying structure of water use such as numbers of households you get nonsense.

Again, I would ask, I know everybody's enthusiastic about certain speakers, but we do have a lot more speakers to go, so if we can minimize applause.

Judith Kahn, and I live off of Garth Road in Albemarle County.

I'm here to speak on behalf of the wildlife, a first, and water around the world, second.

If you haven't walked at least the three and a half mile loop of the Ragged Mountain Natural Area, it's hard to make an informed decision about this

This is a Charlottesville gem.

This is a unique habitat.

Within less than a thousand acres, you have mature hardwood forests with oak and hickory stands.

You have seasonal wetlands.

You have rugged terrain.

People travel hours for this, and it's right off the bypass.

The great variety of vegetation supports over 70 species of birds, including birds that are some of the most magnificent, wood ducks and warblers of many, many different species.

If you've ever been stopped in your tracks by a note from a bird,

It's a rib thrush.

There are five species in this area.

There are also frogs and bats and salamanders which are vanishing across the globe as well as in this country which is right here.

If instead of turning left on Fontaine, coming off of the bypass, you turn right, you can be there.

to flood this area is not changeable once it's done.

You cannot plant 200 saplings and have what you have over there.

Last April, I watched over two weeks while 75 old growth oak trees and towering cedars were clear cut behind my house.

I heard them tumble and I watched them fall.

In 13 years I had never heard a car.

Now I can hear a cough from half a mile away.

Where if we lose this, we do so at our own peril.

People use this area for their aerobic workout, going

three times a week around the three and a half mile loop.

The last time I was there, half a dozen parents were taking 20 children from all over the city and the county.

They were little kids on their first wildlife adventure.

This adds to the quality of life for every person who lives in Charlottesville and who lives in the county.

I also want to say that this water problem is an issue as you all know globally and nationally.

I was in the Middle East in 1984.

They were coming up with solutions that have not even been discussed in this country.

In the next generation, we will have so many new solutions in the next 10 years.

You need to pause in making this decision.

Good evening, Council.

We've heard conflicting opinions from concerned individuals about this proposed water project.

However, in the midst of this disagreement, when we're talking about future plans, I think that

The future of urban development has been the idea of reducing our environmental footprint to conservation of preserving green space of building robust decentralized systems and I think that building this huge monolithic project at great financial cost during trying times when there seem to be reasonable small-scale solutions doesn't make much sense and

Yeah I also, I mean I'm also a mathematician and the idea that people would use linear regression for 50 year forecasts seems completely ridiculous.

That's something that I tutored middle school students on and that a 140 million dollar project is dependent on such forecasts just doesn't make sense to me.

Thank you.

So yeah, there seems to be a lot of conflicting information, a lot of ideas out there.

But I think for the most part you know which ones are right.

I mean we know some of the stuff is wrong already and still it gets bandied about.

The cost of dredging, for instance, and particularly the demand, I have to say, that's really, if I had to focus on one thing, first of all, even the idea that we can scientifically predict how much water we will need in the future, what that does is it takes it out of our hands.

It says it's not a choice, it is just something that happens to us.

And I hope that as a council,

you all will make choices rather than just let things happen to us and we've heard a lot about being a good neighbor but there's a huge difference between being a good neighbor and a patsy and if you're going out

and looking to buy something, a huge thing, something that's more expensive than you ever buy.

When was the last time we were considering as a local area to spend this kind of money, you know, as opposed to a federal grant or, you know, I mean maybe I-64 or something?

Never.

So if you're shopping for this thing and the salesman is right there telling you, you better buy this thing soon, I hope that would give you some pause.

And in this case, the salesman, I would say, although you don't see the salesman, is the sprawl lobby, our regional sprawl lobby.

And, you know, you have the Chamber of Commerce coming up here, and they're the regional Chamber of Commerce.

They do not represent Charlottesville citizens, not even Charlottesville businesses.

First of all, they're a regional Chamber of Commerce, not just Charlottesville, but Albemarle, not just Albemarle, but surrounding counties.

Second of all, they don't even represent the Chamber of Commerce.

The board votes for this, not the membership of the Chamber of Commerce.

So, I don't think that you need to respond too much or put too much weight on that.

And, you know, to talk also on the political rather than just the facts, which I think some of my predecessors have done very well here,

You know, look at who's for this thing aside from the Chamber of Commerce.

We've heard the Free Enterprise Forum, you know, and if you look at the board of the Free Enterprise Forum, every one of them is a lawyer, real estate agent, developer, or banker who works on sprawl projects in the county of Albemarle.

And if you look at the environmental groups that have come up here, PEC, Southern Environmental Law Center, and I guess those are the biggest ones,

Well, let's make a distinction here.

The Sierra Club knows that this is not a good project and has said so.

Note that the Sierra Club here as a local entity has no paid staffers.

PEC, Southern Environmental Law Center, do and also they are wanting to be in good straits with the county who is looking to use the city's

Resources and Money to finance unlimited sprawl growth.

Some growth is good, or at least necessary.

Thank you, Mr. Salinas.

Thank you.

Councilors, first, my name is Galen Stango.

I live at 129 Goodman Street here in the city.

I really want to thank the City Council for its leadership in this area.

I think we've seen over the past couple years and tonight that a lot of the engineering and cost estimation that this plan has been based on

is I guess the kindest thing you can say about it is that it's been inept.

And so I think your leadership has been really crucial in this area in

getting deeper and understanding these issues better and I want to thank you for that.

Other folks have very eloquently described why this is a good idea to dredge first and wait and see if we ever do actually need to build a dam and I want to fully support that and once again thank you for your leadership.

Thank you.

Council members, I'm Scott Andy, I'm from 1639 Cherry Avenue.

Not to affront Mr. Fife, but he said earlier that, well, plans change.

No argument with that.

Plans do change.

The execution, though, is a different matter, though.

And to tell you the truth, I really, really do not expect

any pro-action on this from this council.

I would be surprised if there was any pro-action from this by city council.

Terribly surprised.

And I'm also slightly surprised that no one mentioned how the affected growth from the University of Virginia would relate to this plan.

I'm going to keep my remarks succinct.

We're here basically because of a lack of foresight and neglect and I'd hate to see this continue.

I personally, in my own life, I've come to the decision that I am pro anything that will secure the water supply.

that will assure water supply.

And I guarantee you this, if this hot potato keeps getting thrown about and nothing done, I promise Bob Finrith right now that I will personally walk the streets of Charlottesville for a petition to get this as a referendum on the ballot in 2011.

Good evening Mr. Mayor and members of the council.

Fortunately, the city's decision is one of good ideas and so in that way the council is perhaps fortunate in that all these ideas are good and none of the ideas are all wrong or all right and in that way

I think it's really the way we ask the question.

It's not an either or thing.

I think it's a question of sequencing and perhaps matching up the flow of increments of demand and capital improvement dollars and also importantly our community's ability to conserve water, especially during droughts.

So I think it's a question of sequencing and not an either or.

Tonight I want to talk to you mostly about the characteristics of the South Fork Rivanna Watershed.

We've talked a lot about the pool of water itself, which is the reservoir, but we haven't talked that much about the watershed.

And one of the most profound characteristics of the Rivanna Watershed is its size, particularly compared to the size of the pool of water, which is the reservoir.

The watershed is about 260 square miles whereas the pool of water sub, which is the reservoir, is less than one square mile and this ratio of watershed to

to the reservoir area is over 400 to 1.

And this ratio is actually much larger than comparable reservoirs in the Piedmont.

Typical ratios of reservoir size to pool are about 30 to 60, with the Occoquan being up around 200 because of the unique characteristics there.

The upshot is that we have a very large land area that flows into a relatively small body of water.

And this has advantages and disadvantages.

Another characteristic of the watershed is its head, what we call the head, which is the elevation difference between the dam and the top of the watershed.

The dam's at about 400 feet and the top of the watershed's on top of the Blue Ridge at about 3,000.

And this 2,600 feet of head

represents energy and it's this energy which drives not only water through the system but also sediment and pollutants and soil.

And a lot of the soil that washes into the reservoir is a product of very large storms that come through and waste away stream banks and waste away land.

And it's a product of the size of the reservoir and the energy represented by the elevation difference.

And these are physical characteristics of our watershed that we have to live with no matter what water supply

This project we come up with is a solution.

Now, because of these characteristics, we have an abundant supply of water for the amount of water that the reservoir can hold.

Which is a good thing, but there's also an efficiency issue.

Because in a typical year, we only drink between three and four percent of the water that actually flows through the reservoir.

And so I think a lot of what we have to think about is how to do a system which protects the environment, protects stream flow, but also enhances the efficiency with which we use the system.

And another thing about this watershed characteristics is managing the pollutant sources, of course, and the sediment.

And so whatever we do, we have to realize that we have this large land area with lots of energy, and our management solutions have to be responsive to that.

Mr. Hirschman, I'm going to have to cut you off there.

Oh, okay.

Thank you very much.

My name is Ben Bates and I live at 4220 Rowan Court in Earliesville.

I'm a member of the county.

A person very much believes that all of us are in this together.

This is a regional problem and it's perfectly obvious that our region very much depends on a prosperous Charlottesville and certainly all of us depend on a vigorous water system.

It seems to me a project at hand

is ensuring an adequate water system, water supply going into the future.

We've talked about the large projects.

It seems to me when we do things on a large scale that we've not done before, that we're not familiar with, we get experts.

We've had consultants that you all have hired for their potential expertise on one thing and another.

They come through with a variety of results.

You've questioned some things, had other experts to clear up other problems.

Things that are concerning me in this whole episode and it brings me here is that as I'm hearing these results come through, I am hearing results that tell me that dredging or a combination of dredging and conservation will not solve the long-range problem that we absolutely need.

some sort of an increase in supply and it seems to me under those circumstances of the 2006 plan and implementing your 50 year water supply plan is a plan that does that.

each successive study as I say and yet we're still on the same thing and it's concerning me that in this process we've kind of acquired a group I call the group of no.

This is individuals, groups that are bound and determined to prevent the construction of a dam and don't confuse us with the facts.

No amount of evidence comes through

is going to change these people's opinions.

They, in my mind, are starting to become part of the problem and not part of the solution.

You do have constituencies.

The man saying, vote to constituencies, I think is absolutely correct.

And I suspect if you took a survey of the citizens of Charlottesville and in Albemarle County, most of them would say that we rely on you to secure the future water supply.

of those constituencies would ask that you do that.

And that's my message today is please don't get sidetracked by individuals who are, in my mind, ceasing to contribute to the discussion.

Thank you.

Dan Beaker.

I live on Laird Lane in North Garden.

I am a rate payer, though, through a rental home I own in the city.

I'd just like to say that the major, if not the major, impetus behind this water plan has been efforts to increase stream flows in the Mormon's River.

Those efforts are commendable, and many of my friends are involved in that, and I think they've done a lot of good work.

However, the contention that the health of the Mormon's River depends on this plan, I think, is erroneous.

The health of the Mormon River does not depend on the elimination of the pipeline.

It depends on when and how much water we draw from that pipeline.

If we increase capacity at South Fork, if we fix the vast amounts of water being wasted through leakage, and if we allow energy and water saving technologies to take hold, it will give us vast

more ways to manage that pipeline, it will require far less water drawn from the headwaters of the Mormon's River.

The alternatives to the plan do not abandon the health of the Mormon's River.

Dredging the reservoir in all fairness does have an environmental cost as well, but I would argue not near the effect that uphill pipeline, pumping water year after year, the energy footprint of that,

combined with the destruction of 150 to 200 acres of forest at Reagan Mountain and the domino effect of biological effects that we'll have on that area are not as great.

So I would just say that in the decades to come, I don't think you will be held accountable for taking a more phased approach to this issue by standing up for forest protection and by allowing progressive energy saving

Water Saving Technologies to come online.

Thank you.

Good evening, Councillors.

My name is Alexandra McGee and I live at 1106 River Court.

Given all the data that I've read, the homework that I've done, I'd like to comment on the one area that I do know to be true because I used to live on land adjacent to the Ragged Mountain natural area and walked there weekly in all seasons.

I ask you to come up with a plan that disturbs the habitat at Ragged Mountain as little as possible.

The natural area and walking trails are a simple 10 minute drive from downtown Charlottesville.

City residents can access on this city property a sense of solitude and peace.

Then we return, renewed, to our duties of daily life.

The woman who taught me the plants of the Ragged Mountains is now in her 90s and is not able to be here to speak with you tonight.

One might think that simply raising the water level will still allow for walking in nature, but please consider how the current dirt road to the reservoir would have to be widened and paved to allow for heavy equipment to get to the dam and how that will block migration by deer, fox, turtles and newt, all animals which I have observed there.

Consider how the machines will need to have large swaths of land for storing and moving earth.

Consider the decades it will take for creatures at all levels of the food chain to reestablish their habitat.

All of this will interfere with the haven found there.

It is true that we want to strategize for a regional water supply in the coming decades so we can have water come out of the faucets in our homes and businesses.

But equally important are natural areas for our souls.

I know you have a complex decision to make balancing many factors.

I support dredging.

Please pick a plan which disturbs the fragile ecosystem at Ragged Mountain as little as possible because our well-being, body, mind, and spirit is tied to that ecosystem.

Thank you.

Mr. Mayor, members of the City Council, I'm Daniel Bluestone, 501 Park Hill in the city.

I really wish that it would start to rain.

and if there's time left in my statement, let's have a moment of silence thinking about that.

In 2002, the tenacity of our community came together in an unprecedented effort to conserve water in this community and I feel that we've only just begun to scratch the surface of those conservation efforts.

I saw Mr. Brown smiling behind a $5 million check

undoubtedly feeling that he was in league with conservation efforts.

I think potentially you were.

And conservation and preservation always preaches that you should use and adapt what you already have, you should figure out creative strategies for reusing what you already have, and that you will only build what you absolutely have to.

We've only begun to explore conservation.

I hope you'll join your partner, Mr. Kuttner, in his advocacy that we do just that, that we find more inventive ways to conserve our resources and water in our community.

I keep trying to figure out what the nightmare scenario is that we're facing.

I suppose that development might stop.

I think that that's behind part of the advocacy of the people that feel so strongly that our community should spend so much money for this plan.

immediately reflect on the equity issues that are involved for city ratepayers.

Early on we heard that the Free Enterprise Forum supports this water plan wholeheartedly.

We had members of the Albemarle Board of Supervisors here.

They together, the majority on the Board of Supervisors, represent low tax, small government, low services and education and almost everything else that they provide to their community in order to keep their rate taxes low.

They're more than willing to come up with strategies for our city ratepayers, our city taxpayers, to support growth that benefits their ratepayers.

They think that we will grow our way out of their low tax system.

and they are happy to do it on our dime and on our rate payment.

Unless the city, they're happy to have us pay a big chunk of that and I see a parallel here and I'm sure you do as well between what's going on where we went for an overscale, oversize interchange on 250 and Meadow Creek Parkway that is putting downtown at a competitive disadvantage

with money that's coming out of our purses in order to promote growth 29 North and Pantops.

And I see no distinction between their advocacy of the water plan and that issue as well.

My name is John Cruikshank.

I live at 324 Parkway Street in the north downtown neighborhood.

I've been following the development of the water supply plan since 2005, and I've attended many of the meetings that took place when the plan, the original plan, was first developed, which is different from the one that is being put before you now.

And there are many intelligent

well informed and honest people on all sides of this issue.

My position on the water plan has evolved as new information has become available.

I now believe that a new plan or a revised plan should be in the works and I would ask you to support one that first allows for restorative dredging of the South Fork Rivanna Reservoir

Water conservation programs, many of these are state mandated or federally mandated already.

Toilets are the best example.

But I also think that we should have incentives for conservation in the years ahead.

That could be done financially.

Protection of the Ragged Mountain Natural Area.

A lot of people have already spoken about this very eloquently.

I hike there regularly.

I think that that should definitely be protected.

And I know that just repairing the dam is going to cause some damage there.

I think that's inevitable.

But let's try to minimize that as much as possible.

And if the repaired or the dam has to be enlarged, I would hope that it could be held to the 13 feet, which was part of the original plan.

I also think that I agree with those people who have said that it's important to have healthy water flows in the Rivanna River and the Mormons River.

And I don't think that you're contradicting yourself when you say you're for dredging, you want to keep the same dam or slightly larger and still want to save those water supplies.

I think that the water flows in those rivers.

I think that

that that can be done, but compromise is going to be necessary.

We do need a new water supply plan, and I believe this can be achieved through compromise, goodwill, and unfortunately, some more hard work.

Thank you.

Nathaniel Galea.

That's me, I'm Nathaniel Galli and I'm lucky enough to live like a frisbee throw from the reservoir and I go there with my dog almost every day.

So I probably may be the most frequent user of the reservoir here just in terms of enjoyment.

But I live on Canterbury Road which is awful, it doesn't matter.

You know, I don't have anything to say

A bunch of other people are smarter than I have already said, but I'd just like to, you know, all this stuff, I'll just forget it.

I've been accused of being radical in the past, but I'm here to advocate being a conservative and just saying, you know, it seems that we have a lot of evidence that's saying that we can just

Protect what we already have, if we invest in the infrastructure, if we fix all the leaks, if we, you know, it seems like we don't really need to take on all this debt and go hog wild with the big, you know, big plan with the new reservoir.

I think we should just take our time.

We can dredge the Rivanna reservoir and it seems that we're going to have enough water.

So that's my position.

Thank you.

Leonard Velovich?

Am I anywhere near close?

And if it were Edwards, Jones, or Norris, I'd be 20 years younger.

Members of council?

Earlier this evening you heard a problem caused by sinkholes.

This 50 year water plan supported by the RWSA is another sinkhole.

Obviously the statistics and the costs of the plan are questionable as evidenced by what you've heard this evening.

In fact, one of the root causes

of the water issue is that the RWSA has not maintained the South Fork Reservoir in 45 years, thereby allowing a silt buildup.

We must then question supporting this 50-year plan.

Furthermore, the plan calls for a new or rebuilt Ragged Mountain Dam.

in which will destroy or displace nature around the proposed dam.

Yet the $63 million pipeline, $63 million, the largest investment in the project, will not be completed to fill the reservoir for nine years.

That will be ugly.

I strongly urge the Council

not support the sinkhole of $143 million project, but approach the solution by dredging, which is what the RWSA should have been doing all along.

Thank you.

Good evening.

I'm Dennis Mokla.

I live at 2920 Chimney Springs in the county, and I appreciate your a few minutes, Mr. Mayor and Council members.

Lee Iacocca, who rescued Chrysler, once said, if I had to sum up in a word what makes a good manager, I'd say decisiveness.

You can use the fanciest computers to gather the numbers, but in the end, you have to set a timetable and act.

In 2006, the county supervisors, this body and the Rivanna Water and Sewer Authority unanimously approved the Charlottesville Albemarle 50 year community water supply plan.

And they did so after much thoughtful and reasoned consideration.

I don't think they did so just off the cuff.

The same plan was endorsed by the Albemarle County Service Authority.

Now, I'm not going to pretend and try to convince you that I'm a water expert or that I'm an engineer.

You've all seen the figures and I think they're available to all of us if we want to pay close attention to them and there's a bunch of them floating out there.

But in reviewing the data relative to the water plan, the conclusion seems to be pretty apparent that now four years

Hundreds of thousands of dollars and even more words later, we have found that the decision that was made in 2006 and affirmed in 2008 was a sound decision.

One that would properly manage our water supply for this area in the most environmentally responsible manner.

Officials are elected to represent us and to manage core services and that does include water.

Again, Mr. Iacocca stated a key to good management is decisiveness and that we can throw numbers in the computer, but at some point there has to be a timetable and we have to act.

I don't think anyone can use the term rushed judgment in this case.

More money than necessary has already been spent on studies.

Numbers have been gathered.

Options have been debated ad nauseam.

And the time has come to act.

And I believe it's past time to move forward with the Charlottesville Albemarle 50 year community water supply plan as previously approved.

And I encourage you to please do so.

Thank you.

Thank you, Mayor Norris.

Councilors, I'm Bob Hodes.

I live at 1309 Lester Drive in the city.

It's probably not going to be a surprise that I would encourage you to go ahead and reaffirm your approval of the 2006 water plan as you did in 2008.

There's a lot of information on both sides.

One of the things that I had done was I took some time to look at the matrix that was put together by Charlottesville-Lamar, which I think is an excellent thing to do.

and in looking at the bottom line, some of the holes that are in there, if you take alternatives of just dredging and leaving other things as they are, you're still going to have a lot of other costs that are involved in the current water plan with respect to the water treatment plants.

You're going to have a lot of costs with respect to the pipeline that goes from Sugar Hollow to the Ragged Mountain.

And I think the bottom line is you're going to come up with about the same thing

But you're going to have the problems that were pointed out by DEQ, and that is that if you do not go ahead with the water plan as approved, you're not going to have the ecological benefits, you will not have sufficient water supply, and yet you're going to have the same cost.

Thank you, Mr. Hodes.

Morgan Butler.

Well, this has been an interesting experience.

I think I can say in 16 years on the Board of Supervisors I never had such hateful statements made about the city as I've heard tonight about the county though.

I would just like to assure you because we don't have television so you don't get to know what goes on in our meetings.

I was privileged to be the chair of the South Fork Rivanna Reservoir Stewardship Task Force and I thought that I would speak from what I learned there.

I wouldn't presume to speak for the members of that group.

There were 13 members, 13 meetings, countless hours.

But I think they probably would all appreciate the fact that some of the recommendations have been accomplished like the bathymetric study.

Some of the things I've learned on the Braggart Mountain reservoir will be an enlarged lake and continue to sit in the midst of hundreds of acres of natural and conserved area acres.

Many new acres are being added as soon as this plan is finalized.

from county landowners who live near or have land near that reservoir.

It is a gem and it will continue to be a gem.

The sediment that drops out when it reaches the Rivanna Reservoir is, as David Hirschman has already described, a natural phenomenon and it happens at the end of the Rivanna Reservoir

and forms wetlands that get trees on them and some of those trees are taller than people now.

It is not a stinking swamp even though it was my own organization years ago, the League of Women Voters, that said it would all become a stinking swamp.

We were wrong and it becomes in fact a river with banks that are wooded and it also is a beautiful gem in the middle of our community.

Dredging, if you choose to do that, of the sand at the upper reaches of the reservoir might be removable as a cost effective activity and it might even be usable in the earthen dam.

I think that we called it opportunistic dredging and an RFP that would ask for information about that in addition to the water supply plan is what I would consider a compromise even though some of your speakers have belittled it as a plan.

I think you have an important decision before you for the good of the whole community and I trust that you will make the right decision.

Thank you.

Thank you for this opportunity to come before you.

1967 I stepped off an airplane in San Francisco from Vietnam and I said there are two things in my life.

I will never have a job as bad as the one I left and if I can wake up in the morning

and get a clean glass of water and take a shower, I'll have a perfect life.

That perfect life lasted pretty well until about eight years ago.

The water tasted foul, they asked us to stop taking long showers, and you had to go to a restaurant and eat off a paper plate, which I suspect went right into the trash and was hauled to the dump.

One thing we have not heard all night, we have a water problem.

We must confront the water problem.

Hard work has gone into it.

You've heard about the studies.

You have it in front of you.

I'm here to plead with you Mike.

Take that study.

Act on that study.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Your Honors, my name is Matthew Rozewski.

I reside at 420 East Main Street in Charlottesville.

If I were pressed to choose between dredging and raising a dam which will eliminate parkland solid ground habitat, I would choose dredging and then re-evaluate our needs once every 10 years rather than hazarding assumptions and guesses about what our world and our needs will be like 50 years from now.

50 years ago, long before the internet and urban recycling systems even existed, could we have predicted with accuracy what life and our needs would be like today?

10 years, yes.

50, no.

I'd like to voice a different option.

I'm grateful to live in a city that has many eco-initiatives, such as investing in new technologies for city buildings to make them use less energy.

Forever into the future, the more we invest in energy efficiency measures, the less we will have to spend in increasing energy supply.

Thank you for your wonderful efforts in this area.

For years we've been debating how to spend millions and millions of dollars to increase our water supply.

Each dollar we end up spending for that purpose is a vote against water conservation.

I repeat, each dollar we end up spending to increase our water supply is a vote against water efficiency.

I don't think you want to support eco-unfriendly initiatives, nor do I want to live, work, or dine in a city that spends my money and votes for natural resource usage and efficiency.

You have the power to vote for our natural environment, as you have done so wonderfully with new and renovated city buildings.

Likewise, please vote for, not against, water conservation.

Please eliminate or minimize the amount of our money you spend on increasing our water supply and hence our continued, sometimes irresponsible usage of this increasingly scarce natural resource and instead spend our money on water conservation.

Please stop, step back and imagine what you could accomplish by taking those millions of water supply dollars and instead converting every city business and residence into a water conservation station.

Simply by using our same tax money to support our local plumbers, paying them to go into local workplaces and homes and install low flow faucets, showers, toilets, lawn irrigation systems, hose nozzles.

Thank you for having voted with our money

and many times in the past to make our city be eco-friendly.

Please continue to vote for making our city be green.

There is a lot of momentum pressuring you to vote for water inefficiency compensation measures, but you have the power to stop for a moment, step back, resist the pressures of momentum and consider fresh new ideas.

Make our city set the example for our whole country.

Vote with our money for water conservation.

Continue to make us proud.

Mayor, Councillors, I'm Neil Williamson with the often aforementioned Free Enterprise Forum.

We're actually a privately funded public policy organization focused on Charlottesville and the five surrounding counties.

Our offices are at 550 Hillsdale Drive.

As you've heard, the Free Enterprise Forum supports

the Ragged Mountain Plan.

But tonight you've heard a great deal and I'd like to put you all to the test with a question.

What do these three things have in common?

Mayor Norris, the South Fork Rivanna Reservoir, and Neal Williamson?

I'll break the surprise.

Each was born in the sixties.

Now, without going into which one of these 60's, 70's babies is in a better shape, although Mayor Norris did beat me in the Charlottesville 10-Miler last year,

I think it's important to recognize that Mayor Norris and I both compete in the Charlottesville 10-Miler not because we're going to become Olympic athletes.

Well, maybe our 1970s maybe, but the Masters is calling for you.

But we do so as a maintenance exercise in trying to improve our condition.

The Free Enterprise Forum supports maintenance dredging when it's right in the opportune times.

We do not support it as a part of the water supply plan.

In closing, I want to thank John Cruikshank.

He and I have disagreed on a lot of things over a lot of years, but he's always been thoughtful and I appreciate his point of view and the tenor of his comments.

The water we drink today is the result of a dam that was built before our mayor was born.

I encourage you to think about those 44 years and what would we be drinking 44 years from now.

Thank you, Mr. Williamson.

Good evening.

Kenneth Martin, 222 Langford Avenue, Charlottesville.

I'm going to take a little bit to say that one of the biggest problems I think we've had with this whole process is that we went through a very bad process.

The process that we actually used was a bunch of special interest people sitting around brainstorming, which is fine.

However, as Kudner, who was here earlier, his group started the brainstorming.

and then they thought about cost, engineering and all of that kind of stuff.

They tested it, they put each component under scrutiny and then when they did not hold up the scrutiny they kicked it out and put something else in and they continued to work and to modify.

What is happening here is we'll use the process where we are planning a menu for a picnic

That is, we all get together and I'm going to bring chicken and you're going to bring barbecue or something like that.

And then we all get a menu and say, okay, and we go on.

And then we have our picnic menu.

However, with the plan that we have been proposed and was adopted, unfortunately, our governing parties, not having the correct information, said, well, it looks good to me.

And it never went under any lens of scrutiny.

So I hope we will stop putting these, which council didn't do I'm not talking about you, these special interest groups in decision making positions.

that once they have said whatever they've got to say, we the voters have really very little access to it except that council has graciously extended this process.

It wasn't extended in 2006 but at least it was now and they decided to test some of the components and find the unnecessary information because after you did the brainstorming

then it came out with the testing and you realize you needed more data.

And that's what the lady that was doing the gas, I think, or car or whatever, the one in the black, you know what I'm talking about.

That's what she was saying.

And my brother used to buy the gas for LA, the heating gas, and he never had too much, but most importantly he never had too little.

And the reason why is because he did not use linear

Regression.

I'll give you some short examples on them because I know that we already visited.

Back in 1971, according to an Albemarle County official, they had projected through that method

which we're using with the demand analysis, I have to say.

They have projected that Albemarle County's population in 1995, 15 years earlier than now, was going to be 185,000 people.

In 1995, 185,000 people.

2010, it's estimated to be 95,000 people.

It does not work.

Charlottesville High School was built in 1974.

In 1974, with an estimated 2200 students, by 1980, six years later, we had already started with reduction in force.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor, members of the council.

I'm a life-long resident.

I lived here.

I'd just like to take you back to the 60s and early 70s when I had the pleasure to serve on the Board of Supervisors.

During that time, we did form the Rivanna Soil and Water Authority at that time and the Omaha County Service Authority.

Since that time, they've worked very diligently to see that we've had a good supply qualitatively between the city and the county.

I'd like to see you affirm the 2006 and 2008 plan that's been adopted by both previous city councils and the Board of Supervisors and you've heard all the recommendations.

I followed it through and it is as we tried to provide best service that we could in water and soil to the citizens of the county back in those days.

I'd like to see you reaffirm and commit to that vision that we had there.

I'd appreciate it if you'd do that.

Thank you, sir.

That was the last person who signed up to speak.

Is there anybody else here who would like to speak?

Good evening.

My name is Tim Wilson.

I live at 2652 Jefferson Park Circle in the city.

And I am a strong supporter of dredging and delaying a decision on the dam until we see whether we need it.

But one thing I've learned that whenever there's such strong disagreement on an issue, it probably means there's some truth on both sides, or at least there's got to be something to be said for both sides.

So I've really tried hard with all the respect I can muster to listen to the other side and to process their arguments.

And let me begin with what I find compelling and not compelling.

What I find least compelling is that you should adopt their plan because it was voted for earlier and nothing has changed.

I think previous speakers have made the point of how much has changed due largely to your efforts, and I applaud you for that, for getting more information on

on demand, on the cost of dredging and so on.

But what I find most compelling about their argument is saving the Mormon's River and restoring flow.

I think that's a laudable goal and I think we all would agree that it's something that should be accomplished.

But what disturbs me is that you've been presented with a dichotomy that you can either save the Mormons or you can do dredging and so on.

And as Dan Beaker said, I think that's a false dichotomy.

I think that there's another thing I've learned in this debate.

It's how many smart people there are on both sides who have put a tremendous amount of energy into this.

And I bet we could find a way to restore that flow without a pipeline, without a dam.

In fact, if we do build that dam,

I think demand's going to turn out to be so low that we may never build that pipeline because it'll turn out we don't need it.

And if that's the case, no restoring flow to the Mormons.

Let's be creative.

I think if we get together, we can solve that problem.

But don't use the argument that you should build that dam to restore water to the Mormons.

Thank you, Mr. Wilson.

Good evening.

It's been a long day.

I appreciate your patience.

Richard Lloyd, 1825, Locus Shade Court.

And I think everybody here knows my positions and has heard my arguments before.

I'm delighted

Charlottesville tonight has brought forth a lot of information.

And as I've gone through this for the last three years, I have to say that that information, I'm impressed.

It's an intelligent, it's a smart group of people on both sides.

I would say that over this time, the people who wouldn't meet, who wouldn't talk, who said don't study this, don't study demand, don't study the dam, don't study whatever,

They're the ones that seem to come back and say, you voted for it in 2006, you affirmed it in 2008, and we don't want to hear anything else.

And I think we've all heard that.

We've heard it tonight.

We've heard it at Rivanna meetings.

We've heard it over and over again.

To me, that's not leadership.

And I just want to applaud the people who bring forth new information, the people who unveil the truth, the people who want to seriously deal with this problem and not just stonewall it and say,

We don't want it because you voted for it.

You've got to live with it and no new information should come out.

So thank you very much.

I appreciate all your studies.

I appreciate your patience.

And I really appreciate this forum where you can bring new information out.

Thank you, Mr. Lloyd.

Good evening.

I'm Henry Weintrink.

And as many of you know, I own Express Car Wash.

Eight years and three days ago I was at exactly this spot where new people, your predecessors, told me that I was out of business.

Why was I out of business?

Because we ran out of water.

Now, it's eight years.

Now, we have plenty of water.

Don't kill yourself.

This is not Arizona.

We have 40 inches a year of water.

Most of the time, we don't need reservoirs.

We have plenty of rivers, we have plenty of water.

What we're missing is the bucket that we need for dry periods.

Right now, we're in the middle of a drought.

And I'm nervous.

I have 23 people that depend, their livelihood depends on my business.

And nothing has happened.

This is a debating society.

This is not a way to run a business or a government.

I'm very much for efficient government.

I'm not against government.

I'm very much in favor of good government.

And quite frankly, gentlemen, this is not good government.

I never imagined eight years ago that I would be back here talking about not having done anything.

I expected two, three years later, we would have added to our reservoir capacity.

But we haven't done anything.

We've been debating.

and more than this.

And nothing happens.

I don't care which plan is the best plan.

And if you keep looking for the truth, if you're a scientist, you know that there's never the ultimate truth.

If you're an engineer, you know that you have plan A, plan B, plan C, you make a decision.

Whichever plan you pick is not the perfect plan.

That's engineering.

If you wait for the perfect plan, well, that's going to take a long time.

and if you think that technology is going to bail you out, nobody knows which direction each technology is going to go.

Technology varies, some move fast, some move very slow and if you think you can extrapolate from some benefits that we reached eight years ago forever, you know well all the mathematicians here know that you cannot extrapolate forever.

It doesn't work.

It's a joke.

In my own business, we used to need 60 gallons to wash a car.

Today we use 35.

And we made great strides, but the curve just got asymptotic, as you know.

So gentlemen, please.

manage, govern, do something, but tell me that next year I won't be back here when you're going to tell me that you have to cut my water supply off and I have to tell my people that they don't have a job.

I'm Keith Rosenfeld from 283 Broadaxe Road out in the county.

Mr. Mayor of City Council, we're here again.

I want to thank you for all you've done just like everyone else.

It's not just a pleasantry.

That's really the truth.

Many of you know me.

You've heard from me before here.

You've probably seen some of the things that I've written in the hook with my fellow armchair engineer, Richard Lloyd, and we're happy to do the work and do it.

I don't want to go into details tonight.

You've already heard plenty of them.

I just want to point out a few issues and possible contradictions.

First of all,

We can argue 142, 162, whatever.

We know everything costs more.

When I went on a quick mortgage calculator today, if you borrow $200,000, you pay back $431,000 over 30 years with 6% interest.

So a $200 million plan is really a $431 million plan.

Don't kid yourself.

Somebody mentioned 200 acres of parkland tonight.

I don't know.

I'm not an expert in that area.

But if that's the case, why are you fighting Meadow Creek Parkway?

It's just a drop in the bucket compared with this.

Sam Freilich's new schools, we got some good news from the RWSA.

They're putting the best VCR you can buy today in every classroom in that new school.

And they're putting a new Gistettner mimeograph machine in.

It's going to be great.

Mr. Huja, you may not remember about 15 years ago when I opened a store in the Barracks Road, I called you wanting to take a tree down because it was blocking my side.

And you were absolutely wonderful.

And you really talked to me about how sacred each tree and each life was.

And it was a wonderful conversation.

And we talked about Indian food, and you actually invited me to dinner once.

Unfortunately, I never did get around to that.

But now we're talking 50,000 trees, and I want to take you up on that and have dinner because we have a lot to discuss.

So anytime you got time, call me at Hotcakes.

Dinner's on me.

None of us know the future.

We're not going to know what happens in detail in 50 years, but we can use our intelligence and education to figure it out as we go.

evening mayor, council.

My name is Herb Stewart.

I live at 2958 Meacham Banks Drive in the county.

If that sounds familiar, it's because I'm married to Liz Palmer.

And as a result, I've learned a lot about this over the past few years, probably sometimes more than I wanted to know.

But one thing that I wanted to do, I hadn't planned on speaking tonight, but I wanted to reflect on just some of the few things that I heard this evening.

And one has to do with the city-county divide.

I've lived in the city before.

This whole city-county thing always perplexed me when I moved from Florida.

Someone told me the other day that the city-county line runs through JPJ Auditorium, that one corner is city and one corner is county.

We're all one community here and so it's been nice to hear folks reaffirm that tonight and I think that has pertinent to the ecological environmental issues as well because things that may impact one part of the county and of our watershed

may be mitigated by improvements in another and vice versa.

So in the big picture, when consultants and organizations and lots and lots of smart people on both sides of this have looked at this, there have been varying opinions

but in general the major environmental groups have come down on in the big picture.

This is, the approved plan is the one to go with.

A couple of days.

I'd like to take, just briefly, take you back to 1884 when the city council was considering a proposition.

Someone said, hey,

There's this plot of land over here that would make for a great reservoir for the city.

And I'm just imagining that there would be a group of folks who would say, no, that's a beautiful piece of land.

We're not going to allow folks to cut down those trees and ruin that plot of land.

There are going to be other folks who are going to say, no, it's too expensive.

Imagine the thousands, tens of thousands of dollars it's going to cost.

and a variety of objections.

But City Council did vote to buy that piece of land and in the long run it panned out very nicely because it provided a reservoir and a beautiful place for recreation.

You've heard that that recreation will continue.

I just wanted to reiterate just briefly

My agreement that there are many, many smart people on both sides of this.

I've been heartened to hear the tone of this tonight.

Folks have been sort of maybe taking their cue from John Stewart the other night that we need to tone this down, that I may disagree with you, but I'm pretty sure you're not Hitler.

So that's been nice.

I live in the county on the reservoir and I guess I'll balance out my colleague psychologist Herb Stewart in saying that I definitely want to be here to make a stand for dredging.

I look at this reservoir every morning and we do not want to destroy

this wonderful resource that we have if we let it go to say a swamp say a wetland it's not recoverable we're not going to have that and it's used by so many people for so many various uses of recreational

and as well as the water, as well as spiritual solace for so many people and it will not be that way if it goes to a wetland or becomes a swamp.

and I want to endorse the Norris plan.

We don't have to be.

I'm not a naysayer.

I am a yes-sayer.

Yes, let's save our environment.

Yes, let's give us water.

Who would ever want to come up here and say that you're arguing against not wanting water?

Of course we want it.

and we have another plan that seems like it makes use of all these other things that so many people are saying and why don't we just do that and save our reservoir and also have a dam that will give us water.

Otherwise I think we're at risk of using some outdated data that will end up with a dinosaur that we don't need.

So I really

really make a plea that you take into account all the work that our mayor has done to come up with a moderated plan that I think will meet all of our needs.

I'm Alan Barker at 1651 Brandywine Drive.

My argument tonight for dredging is very simple.

If not done now, the dredging will be done eventually, whether for water supply or other reasons.

The public will demand it, especially this public, as concerned as we are with the environment, aesthetics, and wanting recreation,

So why not dredge now and hold off building the elaborate water supply system expensive to construct and maintain until it is needed, perhaps, which might be decades in the future?

Mr. Collins?

My name is Rich Collins.

I live at 108 Wilson Court.

Mr. Mayor, Members of the Council, I've agreed with so many things that so many people have said on both sides of this issue this evening, but I do think we are one region or one community

and we need a compromise and I think I can propose one.

I think the second thing we need is some action and I think we can get it out of the compromise and here's how it would go.

The initial understanding should be that the permitted plan is not based on how much water we really need, it's based on how much water we could get.

If you look at this as a competition for water of increasing scarce supplies, the James River supply plan was based on the supposition that there was going to be more and more demands on Virginia's water supplies, rivers, lakes, and that unless we captured as much of it as we could get as soon as we could, somebody else would take advantage of that.

In fact, the Virginia State Water Plan is more based on a fear of water grabs than it is on adequate water supply for communities.

Once you understand that, I think we can guarantee that the 18.7 million gallons that some people say we need could be assured by a permit change with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.

If we conserve, we should not be penalized if we make a mistake.

We can have the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers revise the permit to assure us that the supply of water that they say we can now get will remain intact while we get the water we need by dredging.

I couldn't understand for many months why there was such bitterness and such hostility about what seemed to me relatively manageable facts.

And then it occurred to me, and I was a mediator in part of this dispute, that the model that everyone was operating on, especially in the Chamber of Commerce,

was based on the Virginia Beach, Norfolk, Suffolk, Chesapeake competition where each of them were trying to cut each other's throat to get control of their own water supply and Virginia Beach ended up going all the way to North Carolina and causing an interstate lawsuit.

That was a model upon which people are grabbing water.

and if won't you understand that reservoirs and supplies do not mean going back to goal, right?

We don't have to do that.

These are public waters.

If we want to have them impounded later, that's possible.

Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Collins.

Good evening, Mr. Mayor and Councillors.

Colette Hall, 101 Robertson Lane from the City.

I moved to Charlottesville 21 years ago this October.

The first time I came down the hydraulic road hill and saw the South Fork Rivanna Reservoir, I was awed by its beauty and the mirrored reflection of the colored foliage.

I felt like I was driving into a postcard, almost surreal.

I had no idea it was a reservoir, a man-made lake, caused by damming a river, nor did I see the dam.

And unfortunately, Councillor Edwards, neither did I observe a graceful heron.

As the 2006 water plan unfolded, its complexity and soaring future service debt costs, it was shocking to be told that this magnificent reservoir has never been dredged, not even maintenance dredging.

In October 2009, at the city manager's meeting for neighborhood reps, the former city manager, Mr. O'Connell, said, the city will be able to pass a 2011 fiscal budget which could meet our fiscal needs.

However, the 2012 fiscal budget was the year he most feared with dark clouds on the horizon.

To continue to provide for the city's citizens and its schools, it is not the time to undertake a massive multi-million dollar public works project, a project that can be accomplished at much less expense.

As we gather new information about any topic, it causes us to pause, to rethink and to reconsider our former ideas or opinions, and that is a good thing.

Tonight, you have heard from several organizations, pro and con, who are well intended.

You have heard

from county residents pro and con who are well intended.

You have even heard from persons who pay neither city nor county water and sewer rates because they are not on the system and they are well intended.

But, Councillors, you are answerable only to the citizens of Charlottesville, residents who pay water and sewer rates, pay city taxes, vote in city elections, and who are the city electorate.

Thank you, Ms. Hall.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor and members of council.

It's a pleasure to be here this evening.

My name is Mitch King.

I'm a resident of 2530 Wingate Road in Albemarle County.

I run a small business there called Old Mill Power Company, but tonight I'm also speaking as the local representative of a

Grayson County, Virginia dredging firm known as Blue Ridge Sand, Inc. With me tonight, seated next to me in the audience is Mark Fendig, the Vice President and Chief of Dredging Operations for that company.

Unlike the engineering firms who have been hired by

RWSA over the years to express their professional opinions about the likely costs of dredging the South Fork Rivanna Reservoir.

Blue Ridge Sand is the only firm with over a decade of experience actually dredging two Virginia reservoirs similar to the South Fork Rivanna Reservoir to have put a dredging proposal on the table that it was willing to sign up to.

I have a handout here for you.

which is mostly or at least half photographs.

So at this late hour that should make it fairly easy on the eyes.

The proposal that we put forward to RWSA was submitted in 2004 in response to public concerns over the deep drought that occurred in 2002 and what could possibly be done to expand the water supply in the reservoir.

It was an unsolicited proposal which RWSA chose not to act on.

We did, in fact, summarize that proposal for city council in 2008, but I suspect that most of you weren't on council at that time.

So here we are again, just touching on it very lightly.

The rate and quantity at which we proposed dredging was 33.7 million gallons per year.

That's a conversion from cubic yards, obviously.

You dredge cubic yards.

And we were going to do that for five years.

That would have prevented the loss of 90 million gallons of storage to date from new sediment coming into the reservoir and would have restored 77.6 million gallons of storage to date.

In other words, as you look at the reservoir today, had this proposal been accepted in 2004, we would have more than 168 million gallons of storage in the reservoir than we currently have at this moment, and even more if a follow-on contract had been awarded.

The project area that we proposed dredging was the upper reach of the reservoir where the sediments are either less expensive to remove or they actually cost the same amount to remove but they have more value when they're sold on the market so the net cost to the RWSA would be less than the dredging the sediments in the phase two area.

The cost of this dredging we regard as competitively sensitive information because we do hope to bid on a dredging proposal in the future, but they were certainly much less than Gannett Fleming's estimates and much closer to HDR's dredging only estimates for phase one, which they estimated at $7 to $12 million, and phase two, which they estimated at between $7 and $8 million.

The important point regarding the phase two dredging

is that there's $19 million in there for some rather expensive dewatering ponds, which upon, when I questioned the HDR representative at the presentation, public presentation that he made in the city space a couple weeks ago, he said the reason that they required those dewatering ponds was because

Mr. King, your time is up.

Okay, you want to look at pictures or are you done?