On February 5, 1974, a Consent Judgment in the case of Conservation Council of North Carolina v. Froehlke,¹ signed by District Court Judge Eugene A. Gordon, was docketed in the United States District Court of North Carolina, thereby concluding a principal phase of litigation in the B. Everett Jordan Dam (formerly New Hope Dam) project controversy. The Judgment culminated a two-and-one-half-year legal battle in which the environmentalist plaintiffs had challenged the Army Corps of Engineers project on the grounds that its construction would violate the procedural and substantive mandates of the National Environmental Policy Act of 1969.²

By the terms of the Consent Judgment, although the Corps of Engineers was permitted to proceed with the completion of the dam structure, the environmentalist plaintiffs at least temporarily prevented the creation of a permanent conservation pool, thus postponing the clearing, and permitting, for the interim, alternate uses of 14,300 acres which otherwise would have been lake-bottom. The Corps agreed to operate the facility as a dry dam, allowing the water to be discharged from the outlet structure of the dam at the maximum flow rate consistent with the flood protection needs of downstream areas, and to reassess the reservoir water quality aspects of the project. This last point was, as shall be discussed below, the major environmental issue raised by the plaintiffs. Data for the water quality studies and for the operation of the dam as a flood retention structure were to be collected until March 1, 1975, following which a supplemental environmental statement will be prepared and circulated. Upon filing the final statement, expected by January 1, 1976, the Corps may then petition the Court for permission to strip the area and to impound water. Plaintiffs will have 30 days in which to respond to such a petition, and final disposition will be made at the district court level within 120 days.