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BLACKSBURG - Blacksburg Town Council voted Tuesday to scuttle plans for the Toms Creek sewer, quietly punctuating last week's local election victory by opponents of the controversial project.

"In effect we have no project," said Mayor Roger Hedgepeth, who had backed the sewer through a series of 4-3 votes in the past year. The unanimous decision to retract offers to buy easements and to reject all bids for a pump station comes a week after an election widely seen as a referendum on the sewer. The sewer has been a contentious topic for 30 years since Blacksburg annexed the Toms Creek Basin.

Blacksburg voters overwhelmingly supported three council candidates who opposed plans for a conventional sewer through the least developed part of town.

The council Tuesday also voted 6-1 to direct the town manager not to close on a $7.6 million bond issue approved for the project in March. The bonds are the subject of an ongoing lawsuit filed by two town residents. The lawsuit challenges that council acted improperly when it bypassed the five-vote requirement of Blacksburg's charter and issued the bonds under a section of state code that requires a simple majority.

Councilman Al Leighton, an opponent of the conventional sewer plan, said he would like to go ahead with the bonds because the town could find a use for the money.

"There could be a considerable difference in interest rates if we wait until fall or later," he noted.

After the meeting, Councilman Ron Rordam, the top vote-getter in last week's election, said Tuesday's actions mean it will be the new council members who will determine what sort of sewer, if any, is built in the Toms Creek Basin. The new council members take their seats July 1. If no one changes his mind, the conventional sewer - whose construction was to have started this spring - will have support from only two of the seven council members.

Instead, Rordam, Leighton and Vice Mayor Tom Sherman, along with Councilmen-elect Don Langrehr and Paul Lancaster, have called for a new look at a plan to run a sewer line down the U.S. 460 Bypass. This will address the town's sewer capacity problems, they say, and smaller, alternative systems could be used in other areas of the basin.

Kay Kay Goette, who helped coordinate support for last week's winning candidates, came to council's meeting to watch Tuesday's votes. Council's responsiveness has been an issue throughout the past year's sewer debate, and Goette said she was gratified town officials acted so quickly after the election.

"The people had spoken and the sewer was not something the town wanted," Goette said.