Wairarapa Water Use Project Leadership Group chairwoman Fran Wilde has assured residents and interested parties that the church and cemetery will not be affected if the area is chosen as a reservoir site.
"I can absolutely assure the people of Mauriceville West and relatives of those buried there that if it were feasible to site a dam there, and we don't know that yet, the water level would be adjusted so the church and the cemetery were not flooded or impacted," she said.
In an email to Friends of Mauriceville founding member Kay Flavell, Ms Wilde said "I would love to be able to say to you right now that the Mauriceville site will not be used but I just can't do that".
She said she could give a "guarantee" that the church and cemetery would not be flooded.
"These are historic sites and we recognise that."
Friends of Mauriceville was formed in 2008 to preserve and promote the historical Scandinavian cultural heritage of Mauriceville.
Ms Wilde said she was aware that there could be an access issue, with the flooding of South Rd cutting off entry to the church and cemetery.
"If the site was found to be suitable, alternative access would be provided via a new road, to be built as part of the project," she said.
Other historical sites in the area such as Gunder Gundersen's house, an important early settler, would still be flooded.
Ms Wilde said the project group was aware of the area's historical significance.
"Further work is already being scheduled on this and will take any historical sites into account. As stated in the report, the extent of the reservoirs is indicative only at this early stage," she said.
The project group will now look closely at the nine sites and select the ones they want to continue to investigate. Ms Wilde said not all were likely to be included. Technical, cultural, social, economic and environmental factors would be considered.
She was unsure how many sites would be chosen but said a decision on which would go forward to the next stage, of a pre-feasibility study, would be made in August.
However these assurances were not enough for those familiar with, or connected to, the area's history.
Dr Flavell said she hoped Mauriceville West would be quickly removed from the list of potential reservoir sites: "Its local, national and international historic significance, both tangible and intangible, is huge and irreplaceable."
She was not content with just a reassurance that the church and cemetery would not be flooded.
"It's not enough to say that they will save the church and the cemetery, because the South Rd itself is a very important central part of the historic site. [It] needs to be recognised as a historic site that shouldn't be touched.
"It will cause huge anger and sorrow amongst Scandinavian descendants in New Zealand and will cause great surprise in Norway and Denmark that New Zealand is so careless about its cultural heritage."
She said proposing a reservoir on a historic site was bizarre: "The decision was made on purely technical grounds and it needs to be rejected on purely historical grounds."
