Storyline · 1988–1992
In 1988 Chapel Hill asked OWASA to hold off selling Cane Creek Reservoir water to Chatham County until the town and the county agreed on growth planning. In September the Town Council agreed not to annex in Chatham before December 1989 and endorsed the sale, but the OWASA board voted down the council's amendments, and Chatham then rejected the agreement. In November the Orange-Chatham Joint Planning Commission agreed on courtesy reviews of development plans. In 1992 Chatham County asked the Orange County Assembly of Governments to let it buy OWASA water for homes in northern Chatham, and the assembly sent the question back to its member governments.
In June 1988, after Chapel Hill pressed the Orange Water and Sewer Authority to hold off a proposed sale of water to Chatham County, members from Chapel Hill, Carrboro, Orange County, Pittsboro and Chatham County formed the Chatham-Orange Cooperative Planning Work Group to agree on growth planning for southern Orange and northern Chatham. The Chapel Hill Town Council, which had threatened to pull its five appointees from the OWASA board, had asked that the sale wait for a long-range planning agreement with Chatham. On June 27 council member Julie Andresen announced a joint resolution with Chatham County endorsing OWASA's sale of water to Chatham beginning September 30; a September account said the two had agreed in June to hold the sale, which would draw on the Cane Creek Reservoir, until joint planning issues were settled. By September 15 the work group was still divided over how long Chapel Hill should wait before annexing in Chatham.
On September 29 the council voted 7 to 2 for an agreement not to annex any land in Chatham County before December 1, 1989, in return for courtesy review of major development projects in the county; Jim Wallace and David Pasquini voted no, and Art Werner called it a one-sided concession. The same night, after a motion to put the vote off 60 days failed 5 to 4, the council voted 6 to 3 to endorse an agreement letting OWASA sell surplus water to Chatham, with Pasquini, Wallace and Werner voting no; Andresen, who led the town's talks with Chatham, said the vote would help win a joint planning agreement. On October 1 the OWASA board voted 5 to 4 not to add amendments the council had endorsed, which would have limited the sale to five years without renewal and required OWASA to consult its member governments before selling water during a shortage. Andresen said the council might re-examine its relationship with OWASA; OWASA counsel Robert Epting said the changes were not substantive. Chatham then rejected the agreement to buy Cane Creek Reservoir water from OWASA. On November 16 the Orange-Chatham Joint Planning Commission, at its second meeting since that rejection, met in Pittsboro and agreed that each government would send development plans of interest to its neighbors for comment, a compromise reached after Chatham County objected that fixed review boundaries might look like joint regulation.
On April 1, 1992, at the semiannual Orange County Assembly of Governments, attended by the county commissioners, the Chapel Hill council, the Carrboro aldermen and the Hillsborough town board, Chatham public works director Mark Ashness asked to buy OWASA water for 6,000 approved homes in northern Chatham until the county could build a plant on Jordan Lake. OWASA board chair Lois Herring said the utility had water to spare, Carrboro Mayor Eleanor Kinnaird asked to revisit the board's makeup, and the assembly sent the questions back to the member governments.
Every statement above comes from these dated entries in the chronology. Each links to its source.
People with a page of their own whom the dated events above name, those named most often first.
No indexed work is about this storyline itself yet. These are about the sites and people its dated events name, those named most often first, so they may discuss the storyline only in part. Follow a link to find a copy or view the material.
Jonathan Howes, a former mayor of Chapel Hill who served in Governor Hunt's cabinet and later worked in the UNC chancellor's office on urban planning, gave this illustrated talk on the past and future of the Chapel Hill campus. Cassette, 1998.
Thomas E. Ross's geographic study of American Indians in North Carolina. It examines Native peoples' history, cultural assimilation, and social and economic conditions across the state, with statistics. Published by Karo Hollow Press in 1999, eleven preliminary pages and 242 pages with illustrations and maps.
Deed transcripts for the town lots of Chapel Hill and adjoining land from 1790 to the 1930s, compiled by Stewart E. Dunaway. Each transcript keeps only the working facts: grantor and grantee, price, acreage and the metes and bounds of the parcel. Self-published in 2014 as Issue 1G, 702 pages with maps and facsimiles.
Stewart E. Dunaway worked through Hillsborough, N.C., lot by lot, giving each town lot a synopsis of its history, a plat showing where it sits and transcripts of the deeds he could locate for it. The second issue runs to 720 pages with illustrations, maps and facsimiles.
Stewart E. Dunaway's 2015 addendum to his history of Hillsborough's town lots, adding deed records arranged by lot number and further town history, with the expansion of the 1890s covered for the first time. Self-published in North Carolina as version 1.0, 446 pages with illustrations, facsimiles and maps. Topics include deeds, court records, land titles and real property in Hillsborough.
Stewart E. Dunaway's abstracts of civil suits over land heard in the Hillsborough District Superior Court between 1778 and 1806. The district covered Orange, Wake, Granville, Caswell, Person, Chatham and Randolph counties, and the papers concern boundaries, ownership and disputed tracts. Published through Lulu in 2011, 337 pages with illustrations, maps and facsimiles.
William M. Rohe's history of Research Triangle Park and the region around it, published by the University of Pennsylvania Press in 2011. Topics include regional planning and the economic and social conditions of the Research Triangle Park region, one corner of which is Chapel Hill and the university. 298 pages with illustrations and maps.
Stewart E. Dunaway's two-volume edition of the Orange County land entry book, the register in which settlers first claimed vacant land from the state before a grant was surveyed and issued. Volume one covers the first thousand entries, all made in 1778; volume two runs from 1779 to 1795. Each entry is reproduced from the original in the State Archives with an abstract of its contents. Self-published through Lulu in a second version dated 2010, two volumes at 28 cm with facsimiles and maps.
Edward J. Kaiser's history of the Department of City and Regional Planning at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill from 1945 to 2012, published by the department in 2013. The title nods to John A. Parker, 1909 to 2001, who figures in the book. One hundred eighty-six pages with illustrations and portraits at 28 cm.
Mark Chilton's short history of transportation planning in the North Carolina Piedmont, drawing lessons from earlier projects. Subjects include the Cape Fear Navigation Company and river navigation, and the railroads of Chapel Hill and Carrboro, including the State University Railroad Company whose spur brought trains to the two towns. Chilton was mayor of Carrboro when the book appeared. Published by Hand Made Books, Carrboro, 2012, 92 pages with illustrations, maps and portraits.
Stewart E. Dunaway's four-volume set of ejectment cases from Orange County, reproducing the original documents and maps from the North Carolina State Archives with partial transcriptions. The volumes cover 1778 to 1814, 1817 to 1832, 1833 to 1849 and 1850 to 1902. Ejectment suits contested title and possession of land, and the cases include surveys and plats. Self-published in 2010.
Stewart E. Dunaway's transcription of letters exchanged between Jesse Benton and Thomas Hart from 1780 to 1790, concerning Hart's affairs at Hartford, his place at Hillsborough. The letters concern the economic and social conditions of Hillsborough in the eighteenth century and the Revolution in North Carolina. Self-published through lulu.com in 2009, 68 pages with illustrations and facsimiles, and part of the library's Wall Local History Collection.
Albert N. Link's early history of Research Triangle Park, published in 1995 by the Research Triangle Foundation of North Carolina. Topics include research parks, research institutes and industrial research in the state, with the park's own history at the center. 149 pages with illustrations and maps.
Each dated event above names its source, the place to start. For finding more on an event across newspapers, records and histories, see the research guide Follow an event across several accounts. Ask at the North Carolina Room of the Orange County Public Library for help with local sources.
Friends of the Orange County Public Library. “OWASA, Chatham County and the Cane Creek water sale, 1988–1992.” Orange County Indexed, https://focplnc.org/orange-county-books/storylines/chatham-water-sale-storyline-1988/. Accessed October 22, 2026.
