Published: Apr. 20, 2005

By PATRIK JONSSON, Correspondent

Cary, Apex to vote on water bond

$145 million issue would fund western Wake facility

 
APEX -- Less than 20 years ago, the then-tiny town of Apex quenched its thirst from Lake Pine, a dammed dip-in-the-ground near U.S. 64 that, size-wise, might more accurately be called Pine Pond. Today, the town's water comes from Jordan Lake. Good thing, too. With 25,000 more residents today, Apex could slurp up Lake Pine in an afternoon.

So, it was with some sense of symbolism that the mayors of Apex and Cary stood on the rim of the peaceful pond Tuesday to pronounce their support for a new wastewater treatment plant that would provide rapidly growing western Wake with enough capacity to withstand at least 25 more years of steady home and business construction.

The mayors -- Ernie McAlister of Cary and Keith Weatherly of Apex -- said they're also eager to satisfy a state order haranguing the towns for sucking water out of the Cape Fear River basin and dumping it on the other side of Apex, into the Neuse River.

Building the treatment plant "is the right thing to do," Weatherly told a small phalanx of local reporters.

On May 3, voters in Apex and Cary will decide whether to approve $145 million in general obligations bonds ($110 million for Cary, $35 million for Apex) to pay for the new treatment plant, which would be built and operational by 2010. The site announcement hasn't been made but is "imminent," McAlister said.

Cary voters are also being asked to approve a $10 million open space bond that would guarantee that, whatever growth may result from increased water capacity, patches of forest and open land will be preserved for the public.

The cost and scope of the project, meanwhile, are riling some critics. They say some heavy water users may get $200 monthly water bills as a result, though a more realistic estimate is that, by 2012, the bond payments will add about $22 to an average residential monthly water bill of about $50.

Critics say a lower-cost, scaled-down project would be more affordable and could be used to keep population in Cary from going to an estimated build-out in 2030 of 243,000 people, compared to its 108,000 residents today. They say the scale of the treatment plant is basically an open invite to developers.

"Basically, it's the current citizens paying $22 a month from here on out to support growth, and that's going to create overcrowded schools, overcrowded roads and not enough parks," said Harold Weinbrecht, a former Town Council member and growth critic. "As a result [of this treatment plant], this bedroom community will change and will become a lot more urban in both its feel and look."

McAlister said he's not interested in turning a wastewater treatment plant into a social policy divide.

"People who came here before me thought ahead so I could turn on the tap when I bought my house," McAlister said. "I'm not going to let this town get stuck planning for Saturday night when we need to look 10, 20, 30 years out into the future."

If the bonds fail, the communities would likely have to go to higher-interest, non-referendum revenue bonds, since they have an obligation to the rest of the state to process their water in a different way.

The communities are under a state order to undo what happened with the opening of the Cary-Apex Water Treatment Plant in the early 1990s, when the tap was officially opened from Jordan Lake on the Cape Fear side and the drain was laid on the Neuse River side. That arrangement, state officials say, was never fair to cities that draw Neuse River water farther downstream.

Behind the political wrangling, a big part of the issue has to do with topography, where a wrinkle in the coastal plain made Apex the exact point where uphill became downhill for northbound train travelers from Florida. The ridge has no geographical name but is commonly called the Drainage Divide. At 512 feet above sea level and about 150 feet above Raleigh, "Apex is sitting on the rim of the bowl, you could say," said Tyler Clark, chief geologist at the N.C. Geological Survey.

From that lofty perch, voters can begin deciding a large part of the area's future.