[EyesOnIvy] Water Supply Information for Ivy

[Brian Wheeler]

Dear Ivy Residents:

The Piedmont Environmental Council has created a new web site discussing the
water supply issue in Charlottesville-Albemarle.
http://www.drinklocalwater.org/  While most of us in Ivy area are on private
wells and water systems, it is important to understand where our local
government is considering getting water, how it proposes to spend taxpayer
funds to do so, and what the risks (and costs) are to the community and our
environment should we decide to reach outside our existing watershed for
that supply.

One lesson from our work on the Faulconer Construction project is that we
are at the headwaters of the Little Ivy Creek, a watershed that the Nature
Conservancy has recently declared a "very high" priority for protection.
Little Ivy Creek, Mechums River and Ivy Creek all feed in to the South Fork
Rivanna Reservoir, a major part of the water supply system.  Development
near our streams and rivers threatens habitat and risks additional
sedimentation of our reservoirs.

When we founded the Ivy Community Association in 2001, we had 3 major goals.

* Educating citizens in regard to the history of the Ivy area and community;
* Educating individuals and communities in regard to the preservation of
farmlands, forest lands, open spaces, and the habitats required to support
viable plant and animal communities and promote biological diversity;
* Educating individuals and communities in regard to the importance of
protecting and ensuring water quality and quantity for the mutual support of
human populations and ecosystems.

Thus, I share this information as part of our educational goals in the
community.  

Brian

==========================
Brian Wheeler, President
Ivy Community Association 
http://www.albemarlematters.com/ica.htm 
tel: (434) 984-2233


>From the PEC website:

Your Water Supply at Risk
=========================
Help us say "NO" to a James River Pipeline and keep your local water supply
LOCAL. This "Best Place to Live" may increase its urban water supply NOT
with mountain runoff from the Shenandoah National Park, not from the fields
and forests of northwest Albemarle, not from stewardship of our watershed,
but from the James River. Recently, the Rivanna Water and Sewer Authority
(RWSA) assured the County Board of Supervisors that while the James River
was a "different quality" of water from our local sources, this could be
taken care of--the RWSA might simply "need to add more chemicals--at
times--to treat it." 

And, with a pipeline to the James, the South Fork Rivanna Reservoir will
simply be left to silt in over time. With dismissal of the reservoir, how
long until the County dismisses protection of the rural countryside that is
the watershed of the Rivanna? What will the rural landscape along Route 20
south look like after the installation of a massive pipeline? Consider that
the water supply for this "Best Place" might very soon come from a river
that receives Lynchburg's urban stormwater runoff, as well as that city's
treated--and untreated--effluent and industrial pollution. We have
collectively been making the case to County Supervisors and City Councilors,
but they MUST hear from you before they will fully consider these
recommendations.