Catawba River Basin Buffers Advisory Committees

Background
In December 1999, the Environmental Management Commission (EMC) approved the Catawba Basinwide Plan and requested the NC Department of Environment and Natural Resources, Division of Water Quality prepare buffer protection rules that could be adopted by the Commission in May 2000. This would have necessitated having the test of rules drafted by February 2000 leaving little time for stakeholder input. A meeting with several interest groups from across the basin was convened in January 2000 to seek feedback on the request to develop temporary buffer rules. While this group identified a number of issues and recommendations to be addressed during development of rules, their overriding message was that the schedule was far too ambitious to incorporate meaningful stakeholder input.
Following this meeting was a series of discussions with local government and elected officials, primarily in the upper basin, concerning the rule-making schedule and the applicability of the rules. These discussions focused on whether to propose temporary rules that would apply to all streams and lake shorelines in the basin, or to limit buffers to just the shorelines of the major lakes and possibly some streams with degraded conditions.
In response to this series of events, DENR Secretary Holman requested that the EMC suspend any proposal to adopt temporary or permanent rules until a stakeholder process and an adequate time schedule could be established for development of a fair and effective buffer protection approach for the basin.
In September 2000, two advisory committees were appointed by the Division of Water Quality to develop recommendations on the application of riparian buffers in the Catawba River Basin. One committee, the Lower Catawba River Basin Advisory Committee,  represents the interests of groups, organizations and citizens in the lower portions of the basin, (Caldwell, Gaston, Iredell, Lincoln, and Mecklenburg counties) while the other, the Upper Catawba River Basin Advisory Committee, represents interests of groups, organizations and citizens in the upper portions of the basin,(Alexander, Avery, Burke, Caldwell, Catawba, and McDowell counties).
Lower Catawba River Basin Advisory Meeting Summaries
September 8, 2000 |September 25, 2000 |October 9, 2000 | October  23, 2000| November 6, 2000 | November 20, 2000 | December 4, 2000 | December 18, 2000
Upper Catawba River Basin Advisory Meeting Summaries
September 8, 2000 |September 25, 2000 | October 9, 2000 | October  26, 2000 | November 9, 2000| November 30, 2000 | December 15, 2000 | December 28, 2000

Educational Presentations (Presentations are in Powerpoint, Word, Acrobat formats)

1. September 8 presentation to both Upper and Lower Advisory Committees
DWQ Presentation on Protecting Stream and Lake Buffers in the Catawba River Basin

2. November 9, 2000 presentation to Upper Catawba Advisory Committee
Existing Water Quality Programs with Riparian Buffer Requirement 
Comparison of Timelines for Adoption of Temporary vs. Permanent Buffer Rules by the Environmental Management Commission 
Riparian Buffer Requirements in the Neuse/Tar-Pamlico River Basins

3. November 30, 2000 presentation to Upper Catawba Advisory Committee
Final Report of the Technical Advisory Committee 

 4. December 13, 2000 Presentation to Environmental Management Commission Water Quality Committee
Protecting Riparian Buffers in the Catawba: Status of the Catawba River Basin Advisory Committees
December 13 Water Quality Committee Meeting: Summary of the Catawba River Basin Advisory Committee Agenda Items

 5. December 15, 2000 Buffer Ordinances:
Hendersonville Buffer Ordinance
McDowell Lake James Protection Ordinance
Lake James Protection Ordinance Allowable Uses
NC Forest Practices Guidelines Related to Water Quality
Burke County Buffer Ordinance

Rule Language

1. Temporary Rule Language recommended by the Hearing Officers and mailed on May 2 to the Environmental Management Commission  
Temporary Rule Language(PDF)

 2. Comments from upper and lower committee members representing local governments that identified  impaired streams following the February 19, 2001 meeting. The February meeting combined both upper and lower committees in an effort to revisit the temporary language status and to determine how and if to proceed on providing recommendations for the permanent  rules.
Lower Committee identifies impaired streams(PDF)
Upper Committee identifies impaired streams(PDF)

3. Proposed framework for the Permanent  Catawba Rule Language:
Framework for the Permanent Catawba Rule Language(PDF)