Little Italy leaders rejected this week two proposed compromises by Central Arkansas Water that would have kept the utility from opposing the community's plan to incorporate in northwest Pulaski County.
But Kristy Eanes, co-chairman of the Little Italy Incorporation Task Force, said she hopes talks continue with Central Arkansas Water officials.
"I'm really grateful that we're trying to work on this together," said Eanes, whose great-grandfather was a founding resident of Little Italy, then known as Alta Villa.
The utility opposes the 380-person community's incorporation because it would remove 25 percent of the land currently subject to the county's Lake Maumelle zoning ordinance from the jurisdiction of the ordinance, which is designed to protect central Arkansas' drinking water from pollution related to activities within its watershed, or drainage area.
The 14-square-mile Lake Maumelle is the source of drinking water for 400,000 people. It's surrounded by 137 square miles of watershed in Pulaski, Perry and Saline counties.
The 8.8-square-mile portion of Little Italy to be incorporated lies between the lake and the Perry County line. A portion of the community lies in Perry County but would have to be part of a later incorporation.
Eanes and the task force offered a third compromise in their letter to the utility Tuesday, proposing they would lobby a new town council to adopt the zoning code for the town. If the council did not approve it, Barry Hyde, county judge of Pulaski County, would have the authority to rescind incorporation. That proposal also includes encouraging the town council to exempt Central Arkansas Water from franchise fees for as long as Lake Maumelle remains a water source and to invite the utility to give input on the new zoning ordinance for the town.
Central Arkansas Water spokesman John Tynan said the utility could not support that compromise because a town council would be able to repeal a zoning code at a later date, if it desired.
"The options they presented don't give us the certainty long term," Tynan said. "We're open to continued discussions and dialogue, but at this point we're not in a position to remove our objection."
Eanes said she believed the people in the community would be receptive to continuing the zoning code.
"We have a vested interest in clean water," she said. "We love the idea of limiting large-scale development."
In July, Little Italy leaders requested and received an extension from the Pulaski County judge's office on a hearing for incorporation so the community would have time to consider two compromises offered by Central Arkansas Water.
The first of those compromises included stopping the incorporation effort in favor of getting the community recognized as a historic district.
Little Italy leaders rejected that one, citing the 220 signatures from community residents that had wanted incorporation. The letter to Central Arkansas Water mentions town services, state turnback funds, and self-representation and self-government as advantages people were seeking by incorporating.
The second compromise was for owners of 75 percent of the land in town to agree to signing "historic preservation covenants," which would be agreements for extending water-quality regulations.
But Eanes and other Little Italy leaders expressed skepticism they would be able to obtain signatures quickly enough.
The community has a goal of becoming incorporated by its 100th anniversary in December, and the task force estimated gathering the signatures for the covenants could take as long as the year-long effort to gather enough signatures to petition for incorporation to begin with.
Eanes said she had not heard from people saying they would or would not sign such a covenant. She said the decision to reject the compromises offered by Central Arkansas Water was made by the task force.
Central Arkansas Water worked for more than a decade to establish restrictions on land use in the watershed and purchase easements on properties in strategic portions to protect water quality. That concluded in 2013 with a zoning code for the area passed by the Pulaski County Quorum Court.
It went into effect in 2014, the same year the Lake Maumelle Watershed Task Force proposed amendments to the zoning code that were later passed to satisfy watershed residents who objected to the code as written.
Eanes and Chris Dorer, the other co-chairman of the Little Italy Incorporation Task Force, were both members of the Lake Maumelle Watershed Task Force.
Eanes said she hopes for more dialogue with Central Arkansas Water before a hearing on incorporation is scheduled in late September. She still thinks the compromise offered by her group Tuesday was the best way forward.
"This is really what came to mind, and to us it seems like the best option because it would give CAW 100 percent of the acreage in the boundaries," she said.
Tynan said a town council faces many political decisions that would keep incorporation leaders from being able to bind council members in the future. He said he would send a letter rejecting the compromise today.
"Our concern is long-term certainty related to water-quality protections," he said.
Metro on 08/14/2015