Countryside Conservatism and Conservation - Southern Water, Southern Power - page 115

completely. But before this mixing, water discharged from the dams—typically from the
deepest portion of a reservoir near the dam—in the summer season has very little dissolved
oxygen. The EIS authors expressed concern that low dissolved oxygen levels and cold wa-
ter released from Trotters Shoals directly into Clarks Hill would further reduce dissolved
oxygen, water temperatures, and water quality in the latter reservoir. 48
Fishery health and oxygen levels were also related to the Sun Belt's commercial explo-
sion. The Trotters Shoals Draft Environmental Impact Statement observed that the region's
primary industrial sector—the textile industry—utilized significant “quantities of water for
manufacturing and processing.” The Corps identified eleven textile mills in Georgia and
nine in South Carolina that discharged industrial wastes into water bodies that would ulti-
mately affect Trotters Shoals's reservoir water quality. Industry was not the only pollution
culprit: Seven municipalities also discharged municipal wastes into tributaries that would
feed Trotters Shoals's reservoir. The Trotters Shoals dam and reservoir moved ahead, but
water quality, pumped storage, dredging, and earthquake engineering issues generated sub-
sequent EIS reviews. 49
Boosters tried to fight back after facing the new environmentalists and multiple EIS re-
views that threatened to bring the Trotters Shoals dam and reservoir project to a halt. The
first booster to do so was James R. Young. When the dam was threatened by another EIS
review related to a proposed Savannah National Recreation Area in 1971, Young, an as-
sociate editor of the Elberton (Ga.) Star , communicated with an ally about an upcoming
public meeting. Young did not “want the ecology opposition to arrive with any scheme to
make an adverse issue of Trotters Shoals.” If other topics arose, such as pollution, com-
mentators would be told to hold those subjects for a “subsequent hearing.” 50 Young was
not the only Savannah River valley resident who was put off by the new Trotters Shoals
opposition community. Even old hands like Congressman William J. B. Dorn (D) were un-
sure of Trotters Shoals's future, and he encouraged his allies to “keep fighting or this 'far
left' crowd will kill everything.” 51 Finally, Robert L. Williford, like the other old-school
Trotters Shoals supporters, was equally concerned about the emerging and powerful envir-
onmentalists' voices that threatened his water and energy project as well as local author-
ity. In late 1971, the Elberton Star editor expressed frustration over the Georgia Press In-
stitute convention's organizational decision to allot two hours to environmental issues as
requested by the Georgia Conservancy, an Atlanta-based nonprofit founded in 1967 (see
Chapter 7). Williford branded the Georgia Conservancy “a highly controversial group of
environmentalists who are fighting the activities of the US Corps of Engineers, the Soil
Conservation Service and other agencies engaged in such projects as stream improvement,
flood control, harbor improvement, snagging operations, watershed conservation and mos-
quito control.” As a newspaper man and Trotters Shoals supporter to the core, Williford
“strongly” opposed the conservation agenda item, and he requested that the time slot be re-