20 Reasons Why True North’s Logging Plan Is Not Right For Orange County
Last month, OWASA-contractor True North unveiled its “forest management” plan for 1900
OWASA-owned acres, most of which lie inside Orange County. The plan calls for the
logging and herbicidal spraying of hundreds of acres around the Cane Creek Reservoir. The
plan does not consider the unique circumstances that logging around a public water supply
presents.
Water ecologists, scientists, elected officials and citizens have shared their concerns about
the plan in letters to local newspapers, in speeches and in phone calls to elected officials.
Many of these concerns can be found on www.chapelhillwaterquality.com.
Among the many reasons why this logging plan is bad for Orange County are as follows:
1) The plan’s authors, a commercial forestry company, did not look into the impact that this
plan’s logging would have on water quality. They did not seek the input of forest
ecologists, water quality experts or scientists. They did not check this plan with interested
regulatory entities, such as the Department of Natural Resources. The resulting forestry
plan does not, in any way, consider the impact this plan would have on water quality or
public health.
2) This plan recommends the spraying of the herbicide Arsenal on lands adjacent to the
Reservoir. The EPA reports that this herbicide has been known to threaten endangered
species and damage non-target plants.
3) OWASA reports that it has no idea how much this plan will cost. Without this baseline
financial knowledge, no one can know if OWASA is being taken advantage of by its
contractor or if OWASA customers will suddenly see rate increases due to fiduciary
mismanagement.
4) Because this plan was created from the perspective of a commercial forester, it defines a
healthy forest as one that includes marketable timber, not one that is necessarily good for
water quality.
5) Local forestry officials admitted that they had not thoroughly read this plan. After last
Tuesday’s public meeting, one forestry official even said that this plan “is not the right
one for water quality.”
6) As the plan’s designer and implementer, True North created this plan in a clear conflict of
interest. There is no way now to tell whether its logging recommendations are based in
scientific necessity or profit motive. Furthermore, one must wonder about the plan’s
scattered profit-minded mistakes, such as the mislabeling of hardwood parcels as pine
parcels.
7) This plan recommends the clear-cutting of mixed hardwood areas and replacing them
with loblolly pine monocultures. This switch converts the local, indigenous forest with
pine tracts which can be logged into perpetuity. This is bad for forest environments
throughout the entire County. It makes all area forests more susceptible to catastrophic
disease, such as root rot, and pest attacks, such as pine beetle infestations.
8) The plan calls for clear-cutting of hundreds of acres adjacent to the Reservoir water’s
edge, which will have huge impacts on drinking water quality. Scientists have
documented clear cuts near watersheds to have the following effects:
 increased water temperatures due to a decrease in woodland shade
 increased algae bloom growth due to warmer waters
 increased sedimentation due to ground-cover disturbance and
controlled burning
 increased illegal dumping, poaching and trespassing because of new
logging road construction into the Reservoir lands
 increased danger of brush fires because of tree-top debris piles
 increased fecal-pathogens in water supplies because of new grazing
areas
 increased chance of destabilized ecosystems because of overstressed of
riparian buffers
 destabilized hyrograph because of increased in pine monocultures
 decreased natural filtration abilities because of the removal of oldgrowth canopied trees and the removal leaf litter through controlled
burning
 decreased ability for forests to absorb carbon dioxide and offset global
warming’s effects
 decreased age diversity, and resilience, in all of the County’s forests
9) Erosion problems and sedimentation build-ups can be expected for three to five years
following a clear cut. By making multiple entries into the same properties, this plan
ensures that sedimentation problems will continue in the Reservoir waters indefinitely.
10) This plan goes against OWASA’s mission and the company’s later missives which advise
the water company to carry out only those actions which maintain or increase water
quality. Past OWASA Board members instrumental in the acquisition of Cane Creek
lands are horrified that these parcels, which were purchased for watershed protection, are
now being logged.
11) Studies show that for every 10 percent of forest land clear-cut around a watershed, there
is a 20 percent increase in chemical treatment costs at the water facility. OWASA
customers stand to lose money in the long run due to an increased need for chemical
intervention and treatment.
12) This plan calls for roughly 200 logging projects in the watershed area, all of which are
around the homes and roads of rural residents. The sheer magnitude of the current plan is
a threat to public health, local infrastructure and public safety.
13) By decreasing species diversity within the Reservoir’s woodlands, the plan makes the
forests less able to weather droughts, disease and ice storms, including 21st century
environmental fluctuations.
14) This plan does not consider the effects that such widespread logging would have on local
habitats. The state Wildlife Commission usually does an inventory on its species
populations. That best practice was not carried out here. Furthermore, this plan does not
consider the growing problem of forest fragmentation for local species. The Cane Creek
Reservoir represents one of the last few areas in the County providing a deep forest
habitat hospitable to Bald Eagles, Flying Squirrels and more.
15) This plan came into being without the consultation of a scientific or citizen advisory
board, which could have mitigated the negative impacts on water quality, forest habitats
and rural residents.
16) OWASA did not do its due diligence in contacting concerned landowners before its
November 30th public meeting. Many rural residents with land bordering OWASA lands
were not contacted at all.
17) The current plan adds insult to injury for the local rural residents who live in the
watershed area. After OWASA all-but bullied land owners during the construction of the
Reservoir, now local rural residents face lifetimes of noise pollution on an industrial
scale.
18) The company that designed this plan, True North, is the same one that clear-cut
OWASA’s Wildlife Mitigation Tract near Buckhorn Road. This site, which was
originally designed to offset the displacement of animals from the Reservoir construction,
is a scar on the County’s conscience. The site, off Martin Road, which was filled with
towering red and white oaks, is now a vast moonscape of compacted clay inhospitable to
any living creature.
19) The plan currently professes to use Jordan Lake rules for riparian buffers. These rules are
the bare-minimum, providing only 50’ clearance to the water’s edge. Orange County’s
ordinances require 80’ buffers for development and the Clean Water Trust Fund requests
300’ buffers.
20) The plan does not consider this plan’s concordance –or dissonance—with County growth.
There is no mention of how this plan’s extensive logging helps or detracts from the
County’s planned growth patterns. If anything, OWASA, as one of the largest land
owners in the County, should be considering ways to increase woodlands to mitigate the
ill-effects of private development and population growth.