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The Ozark Headwaters Group of the Sierra Club met Wednesday to discuss proposed changes to water quality standards affecting Lee Creek, a waterway originating just south of West Fork and flowing southwest to the Arkansas River near Van Buren.

The Arkansas Pollution Control & Ecology Commission’s Regulation No. 2 designates certain streams and waterbodies as extraordinary resource waters, a designation that provides extra stream protection. The regulation prohibits any activity that would significantly alter these resource waters.

The River Valley Regional Water District, which serves all cities in Crawford County, has requested the Arkansas Pollution Control & Ecology Commission amend this regulation so it can build a dam on Lee Creek in order to provide water to its customers.

The commission granted the district’s request for third-party rulemaking in January, initiating a process in which the district will propose an amendment to the language, allowing creek to be altered for the purpose of providing drinking water.

The proposed language would not only affect Lee Creek but all extraordinary resource waters in the state, according to Martin Maner, Chief of the Water Quality Division for the Arkansas Department of Environmental Quality.

Extraordinary resource waters are defined as a "combination of chemical, physical and biological characteristics of a waterbody and its watershed which is characterized by scenic beauty, aesthetics, scientific values, broad scope recreation potential and intangible social values."

According to Maner, the ADEQ is holding a series of meetings to gather public input on the issue of extraordinary resource waters. Public input will be used to revise the language regarding extraordinary resource waters to allow them to be used for drinking water if all other viable alternatives have been exhausted. Maner said there is a way to use extraordinary resource waters as a water supply without damming them and harming the water quality. "We want to craft the language to make sure that all other alternatives have been exhausted," he said. "So we have an alternative to what’s being proposed by the third party." The meetings are part of a review process that must be conducted every three years as mandated by the Federal Clean Air Act. ADEQ will host a public meeting at 6 p.m. tonight at the Clarion Inn.

Meanwhile, the commission is holding several hearings on the specific proposed change to Regulation No. 2 as it relates to Lee Creek. The first hearing on the regulation is scheduled for March 27 at Northridge Middle School in Van Buren. Other meetings will take place at 6 p.m. on April 3 at Arkansas State University, Mountain Home; April 10 at the Jones Center for Families Chapel in Springdale; and at 1 p.m. on April 17 at ADEQ headquarters in Little Rock.

Maner said the best way people can participate is to show up at the hearings and make a statement. People should also attend the ADEQ public meetings, he said, and give their input. They can also volunteer to be a part of the work group that will be charged with drafting the revised language to Regulation No. 2.

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