The question of how best to protect Mill Mountain has divided Roanokers for decades.

And that continued at a meeting of the mountain's advisory committee Thursday over a key issue at hand: a conservation easement planned for the mountain and what it should entail.

On Monday, the public will get its say on the latest version of that debate: The Roanoke City Council is scheduled to hold a public hearing on the easement that's been proposed for the mountain and whether it should include a site previously targeted for a commercial restaurant.

The easement would prohibit development of about 550 acres of wooded slopes that have been part of a city park since the 1940s. Former Gov. Tim Kaine announced plans for the easement last fall before leaving office, but it's taken until now to finalize work on the proposal.

Complicating matters is a question of whether 2.8 acres on the top of the mountain should be included in the easement.

That key piece of land was the focus of an intensive and divisive debate that started in 2007, when Valley Forward, a group of young professionals, proposed developing the site into the Rockledge Community Center, which would include a restaurant, community room and cafe.

The proposal stalled with the economic downturn in mid-2008, but some council members worry that including the land in a conservation easement would handcuff future generations.

On Thursday, the ad hoc Mill Mountain Advisory Committee, which advises the council on mountain matters, moved its regular monthly meeting up a week so it could discuss the matter.

The group first voted 6-2 to support the concept of an easement. It then voted 5-3 to favor an option that would include the proposed Rockledge site within the easement.

Neither vote is binding on the council's decision Monday, and both came after some pointed debate between committee members.

Steve Higgs, the committee's chairman, and Chick Pace both opposed the easement.

Higgs, a lawyer, suggested the legal wording in the easement will only create more disagreements on property that's already protected by zoning and by restrictive covenants included in the deed that was granted by J.B. Fishburn to the city.

Roanokers have spent decades arguing over the language in those existing protections, Higgs said, and even though the proposed easement is a boilerplate document that's served as the template for dozens of other easements, it will only complicate matters further.

Pace, meanwhile, worried that the easement would restrict future generations from actions that may be needed for reasons that can't be foreseen.

"Our grandchildren can be impacted by this some 50 years down the road," Pace said.

Committee member Louise Kegley, who supports the easement, challenged him: "How?"

"I don't know -- and neither do you," Pace responded.

After a vote to endorse the easement in concept, the committee followed up with another vote to favor the easement that includes the site of the proposed Rockledge revamp. Pace, Higgs and Carl Kopitzke dissented, while Kegley, Dick Clark, Betty Field, Kae Bolling and Eddie Wallace voted in favor of it.