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Summary of North Carolina Initiatives to Improve Water Quality

Governor Hunt's 1998 Clean Water Budget - On May 4, 1998, Governor Jim Hunt announced an aggressive clean water budget plan to continue the state's fight against pfiesteria and water pollution and to strengthen marine fisheries protection. The plan, included in the Governor's $101 million environmental budget, focuses on three key components -- prevention, detection and response -- to combat water pollution. The budget includes critical funding to reduce nutrients and sediments in North Carolina waterways, expands coastal recreational water quality monitoring to inland waters, support the state's river basin planning program, provide more aggressive responses to fish kills and boost the state's compliance and enforcement efforts. Hunt's $34.9 million clean water initiative includes $2.1 million to reduce sedimentation and $4.1 million to implement the Fisheries Reform Act passed by the General Assembly last year. The fisheries request will support the development of plans to improve our coastal fisheries habitats, improve data collection and management, and restore and protect fisheries stocks. The budget calls for $4.5 million in Agricultural Cost Share funds to provide technical assistance to farmers and support their efforts to use best management practices (BMPs) to reduce run-off.

Conservation Reserve Enhancement Program - The Clean Water Management Trust Fund has committed $39.3 million over a six-year period to the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) for use in a proposed $274.6 million package to protect and restore North Carolina's waterways. On April 27, 1998, the fund trustees voted to support the proposal and approved $5,885,549 for fiscal year 1998-99. DENR and the Clean Water Management Trust Fund are preparing a $274,610,165 proposal to the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) for up to six years of funding to purchase 100,000 acres of agricultural land next to rivers, streams, field ditches and wetlands, and install best management practices (BMPs). Eligible land must be actively and primarily in agricultural use. The proposal would use $53.6 million in state funds, which include the trust fund commitment, to attract $221 million in federal funds for the effort. The proposal will cover three eastern river basins (Chowan, Tar-Pamlico, and Neuse) and the Jordan Lake watershed, where nutrient runoff from agricultural operations is a prominent water quality problem.

Enhanced Enforcement Program - Governor Hunt appointed Wayne McDevitt as new DENR Secretary on August 1, 1997. On August 7, 1997, McDevitt directed the state's water quality programs to take stronger enforcement actions against polluters of North Carolina's waterways. The new enforcement policy includes the following:
1) increased penalties for water quality violations;
2) a plan for improved "bad actor" enforcement, including consideration of Department-level investigation capability for environmental crimes, streamlined permit revocation processes, increases in the statutory caps on penalties, and any other changes, that are crucial to having top-notch "bad actor" enforcement capability in water quality protection programs; and
3) a review of how divisions now do water quality enforcement and otherwise encourage compliance and recommendations on steps that should be taken to strengthen compliance and enforcement policy for water quality.

Governor's Water Quality Initiative - On May 1, 1997, Governor Jim Hunt announced a plan to make sure the state's waterways are cleaner and safer through stepped up monitoring of coastal waters, additional resources for pfiesteria research and a new Neuse River Rapid Response Team. Coastal recreational water monitoring efforts were expanded to include more than 1,300 sites. The Rapid Response Team is equipped to respond to fish kills quickly in order to better determine causes and conditions. The state had already funded $600,000 to support studies of potential health problems and causes of pfiesteria when the Governor earmarked an additional $638,000 for equipment, improved facilities and a national information bank at the Water Resources Research Institute. On March 20, 1998, Governor Hunt announced an aggressive plan in preparation for the coming fish kill season. The governor allocated $2.9 million for:
- a rapid response team for the Tar-Pamlico;
- additional flyovers to spot fish kills, sediment pollution and algal blooms;
- additional pfiesteria research;
- a public education campaign about pfiesteria,
- and warning signs along estuarine waters to advise people to avoid dead, dying or sick fish.

Federal Pfiesteria Funds Workshop - In 1997, the U.S. Congress appropriated $13 million in federal funds for research into the environmental processes that facilitate and regulate harmful algal blooms in the coastal ocean, with particular emphasis on pfiesteria and related species. DENR co-sponsored with the Department of Health and Human Services a workshop January 15, 1998, to bring together federal officials involved in the grant-making process with interested North Carolinians to discuss the variety of newly available funds and plans for their distribution and use. The workshop was designed to facilitate a productive dialogue on a range of available funds and funding needs and to ensure that North Carolina plays a significant part in developing solutions to issues presented by the presence of toxic pfiesteria in our nation's coastal waters. Thus far, the EPA and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration have committed $450,000 from the available funds to research in North Carolina ($300,000 to the state for rapid response efforts and water quality monitoring and $150,000 to Dr. JoAnn Burkholder for testing samples from several coastal states including North Carolina).

Pfiesteria Team - In January 1998, the DENR established a team to develop a comprehensive response to the pfiesteria complex of toxic dinoflagellates through:
1) Collaboration and partnerships between DENR, experts in water quality, fish kills, fish disease, Pfiesteria research, and other states;
2) The establishment of processes and protocols for sharing data and communicating information, and
3) Making recommendations on additional research and funding needs that will further our knowledge of pfiesteria.

Clean Water Management Trust Fund - The fund, created by the 1996 General Assembly, is established to help finance projects that specifically address water pollution problems and focus on upgrading surface waters, eliminating pollution, and protecting and conserving unpolluted surface waters, including urban drinking water supplies. This fund is also intended to be used to build a network of riparian buffers and greenways for environmental, educational and recreational benefits. It is also expected to enhance wildlife and marine fisheries habitats in the state. The trust fund generates approximately $50 million annually.

Clean Water Responsibility and Environmentally Sound Policy Act - The bill, signed by Governor Hunt on August 26, 1997, has been hailed by environmentalists as the most significant piece of environmental legislation in North Carolina history. It puts a moratorium on hog farms, requires comprehensive planning across the state to ensure clean water and gives counties the right to zone large hog farms and restricts where hog farms can be built. The new law also tightens limits on the amount of nitrogen cities and industries can discharge into nutrient sensitive waters, requires additional stormwater controls and authorizes studies of water pollution.

Smithfield Foods Permit - In January 1998, the state announced a new permit for the Smithfield Food Processing plant in Bladen County. Working with the company, the Division of Water Quality issued a permit which requires the slaughtering house to only accept animals from farms in compliance with state regulations.

Neuse River Nutrient Sensitive Waters Strategy - The N.C. Environmental Management Commission has developed and approved a plan for managing the Neuse River's nutrient pollution problems. The strategy's goal is to reduce by 30 percent the loading of nitrogen into the Neuse River by municipalities, factories, developments and farmers. The plan includes provisions involving protection of both sides of streams from nutrient run-off, wastewater discharges, stormwater management, agricultural best management practices (BMPs), and application of nutrients to golf courses, recreational lands, residential, commercial, industrial, right-of-way or other turfgrass areas.

Wetlands Restoration Program - The restoration program, passed by the 1996 General Assembly, established in the Department of Environment and Natural Resources a non-regulatory statewide wetlands restoration effort for the acquisition, maintenance, restoration, enhancement and creation of wetland and riparian resources that contribute to the protection and improvement of water quality, flood prevention, fisheries, wildlife habitat and recreational opportunities. Its purpose is to restore wetlands functions and values throughout North Carolina which will result in a net increase in wetlands acres, functions and values in each of the state's 17 river basins.

Marine Fisheries Reform Legislation - The legislation, passed by the General Assembly during the 1997 session, is designed to improve fisheries management in North Carolina. It requires that detailed plans be developed for improving fish habitats and managing fish stocks. It also calls for stricter enforcement of fisheries laws, including increased penalties for illegal fishing, higher fees for commercial licenses and a cap on the number of licenses issued. The reform legislation addresses four key areas: resource planning and management, organization, licensing, and law enforcement and public education.

Sedimentation & Erosion Control Plan of Action - In response to Gov. Jim Hunt's call to crackdown on sediment in North Carolina's waterways, the State Sedimentation Control Commission has adopted a plan to reduce amounts of the pollutant reaching the state's rivers and streams. The plan, which addresses erosion from construction projects, calls for expanding and enhancing erosion control requirements, toughening enforcement practices available to the state and locally delegated programs, and increasing technical training and education.

Kinston Penalty - In an innovative way of using a fine to provide water quality benefits beyond normal enforcement/compliance efforts, the Division of Water Quality and the City of Kinston agreed in March 1998 to use $50,000 of an $89,650 water quality fine to establish a water management training program at Lenoir County Community College.

Senate Bill 1217 - This legislation includes the recommendations of a Blue Ribbon Commission on Animal Waste which was convened to address issues related to the management of waste generated by intensive livestock operations in North Carolina. It requires the permitting of all animal waste management facilities and requires inspection of those permitted facilities. It also requires the certification of animal waste management system operators.

Strengthened Agricultural Cost Share Program - The N.C. Division of Soil and Water Conservation has been working diligently to increase statewide compliance by animal operations and to improve processes for the distribution of cost share funds with a focus on water quality protection. The division is conducting performance reviews of county programs which have improved the targeting and tracking of the funds.

Dam Removals - One of the major roadblocks to improving fish migration in the state was the Quaker Neck Dam that straddled the Neuse River just below Goldsboro. In the first voluntary dam removal of its kind, Carolina Power & Light Company, owners of the dam, worked with several state and federal fishery management agencies to solve the problem. Removal of the dam is expected to greatly improve the migration of several important commercial and recreational fish up the Neuse River, to spawn and return to the ocean. Funds were pooled from several state and federal agencies and the dam removal process began Dec. 18, 1997. On May 28, 1998, concrete came crumbling down at the Cherry Hospital dam, as the state began removal of the dam that spans the Little River near Goldsboro. The dam removal will improve the spawning opportunities for fish that migrate up inland waters before returning to the ocean. The small earthen - steel dam -- 135-feet wide and seven feet high was built by the state about 50 years ago to impound water for use by nearby Cherry Hospital. A few years ago, the hospital began buying its water from the City of Goldsboro and the dam was no longer needed. Removal of the Cherry Hospital dam will open 21 miles of the Little River and 33 miles of tributaries to the fish species that migrate from the ocean. Fish species that will benefit from the removal of the Cherry Hospital dam are American shad, striped bass, short-nosed sturgeon, Atlantic sturgeon, hickory shad and alewife.

Environmental Education - North Carolina has initiated a series of environmental education efforts to support the river basin strategy. They include:
1) Executives of 10 major home lawn fertilizer manufacturers and lawn care services from North Carolina, Florida, Georgia, Alabama, Virginia and Ohio are collaborating to use their corporate policies, resources, networks and employees to raise public awareness of natural river basin systems and human impacts on these systems. The program will go be made public in spring of 1998.
2) Carolina Power & Light, Duke Power and North Carolina Power companies are collaborating to implement an adult environmental education initiative using billings to raise public awareness of river basins in North Carolina. The inserts will reach over 2 million households four times in two years.
3) The North Carolina river basin environmental data is being integrated into classrooms as a result of teacher training workshops using geographic information systems (GIS) to develop classroom activities.
4) The Department of Transportation has erected "Neuse River Basin" signs at 38 locations along major highways in 12 counties in the Neuse River Basin to make the traveling public aware that they live and work within the basin.

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Date Posted: July 1


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