An end to water debate?

City councilors are poised to reaffirm their support tonight for the community’s 50-year water supply plan, potentially drawing to a close one of the Charlottesville area’s most heated policy debate in years.

Three councilors — David Brown, Satyendra Huja and Julian Taliaferro — said Sunday that they intend to back a resolution reiterating the council’s 2006 endorsement of the $142.8 million proposal, which has been questioned in recent months by a growing contingent of city residents and leaders. The Albemarle County Board of Supervisors last month unanimously approved the plan for a second time.

“I think we need to move ahead with it,” Taliaferro said. “I don’t want to gamble with the future of the community’s water supply.”

But a new, and possibly influential, critic has emerged on the eve of the important vote: Kendra Hamilton, one of the five councilors who originally endorsed the water supply plan.

Hamilton is urging her former colleagues to postpone the vote and to commission additional studies exploring other options.

“I really don’t understand the hurry,” said Hamilton, who sent a long e-mail this weekend to city leaders explaining her opposition to council’s resolution.

“Right now, when people have so many questions, to have a public hearing and then two weeks later endorse the plan as if nothing was said sends the wrong message.”

The plan calls for the construction of a new dam at the Ragged Mountain Reservoir and, to fill it to capacity, the building of a pipeline from the South Fork Rivanna Reservoir. The water level in the reservoir would be raised by 45 feet — increasing storage from 464 million gallons to 2.19 billion — while submerging an estimated 180 acres of forest.

Detractors, including former Councilor Kevin Lynch, contend that dredging silt out of the South Fork reservoir is a better option that would save millions.

The Rivanna Water and Sewer Authority rejected dredging as an alternative after a consultant concluded that it could cost up to $223 million. However, other consultants have estimated in recent weeks that dredging might only cost between $20 million and $35 million.

Lynch and other opponents of the plan have beseeched councilors to support a study of dredging to see if it is truly a viable alternative. He and others have generated a list of options that include dredging and would cost between $80 million and $110 million. Some parts of the plan, including the expansion of treatment plants and infrastructure replacement, need to happen regardless of whether dredging is used.

Now Hamilton is joining the growing chorus of those who think more study is necessary.

“If the plan is so strong it ought to be able to withstand a little scrutiny,” she said. “And if there’s a rush, maybe the plan is not as strong as they are saying.”

However, a letter sent last week by the deputy chief of the state’s Department of Environmental Quality cast doubt on the feasibility of dredging the South Fork to solve the area’s water requirements.

The department “does not believe that the projected water need can be met through dredging alone” and that dredging would require another permit application, Richard Weeks wrote to councilors and dredging advocates.

That’s why the plan on the table is the best choice, Councilor Brown said. Building a 45-foot dam is cost-effective, and the plan will help the environment by restoring the Moormans River, he added.

“Dredging is just not a particularly attractive financial option,” he said.

Brown, Taliaferro and Huja all said Sunday that maintenance dredging to improve the reservoir is worth considering, but that it should not be a substitute for the $142.8 million proposal.

Mayor Dave Norris thinks there’s a middle ground and will float a compromise solution tonight. He backs the resolution but also wants to commission a dredging feasibility study.

“I support moving forward with the design of this system,” he said. “Right now we have no support that dredging is even feasible. But let’s also move forward expeditiously on exploring dredging.”