“Georgia Owns the Chattahoochee”
At a moment when Georgia is attempting to wrap-up negotiations with Alabama and Florida to bring an end to the decades-old tri-state water wars, such a statement comes across as inflammatory and inappropriate. Pat Stevens, of the Atlanta Regional Commission (ARC), passed this judgment at a recent meeting on Lake Lanier’s shoreline before the South Hall business coalition of the Hall Chamber of Commerce as reported by AccessNorthGa.com and the Gainesville Times.
The ARC’s Chief of the Environmental Planning Division also attempted to blame metro Atlanta’s water supply problems on Jimmy Carter, Flint River famers, and selected downstream stakeholders.
Historical Detour: Governor Carter did indeed pull the plug and reject an Army Corps of Engineers’ plan to build the Sprewell Bluff multiple purpose dam on the Flint River back in the early 1970s as Stevens alluded to. However, he did so – in the context of the inflation crisis and calls to cut state and federal spending – after running a simple cost-benefit analysis where he discovered the numbers did not add up. The Sprewell Bluff project was officially deauthorized (p. 193) in 1986, not under President Carter’s watch but during the Ronald Reagan administration.
Today’s ACF Stakeholders: Without Flint River dams, according to Stevens, irrigation-farmers pull so much water out of the ground and the Flint River that the Chattahoochee River (and Lake Lanier) has to make up the difference for required flows at the Florida state line. But other stakeholders also require ACF water. For example, Alabama Power’s nuclear Plant Farley, located well above the Florida state line, ultimately uses Chattahoochee water released from Lake Lanier. Stephens also blamed endangered species for the required 5,000 cfs release from Jim Woodruff Dam, but according to a Congressional Research Report (p. CRS-15), Gulf Power’s Plant Scholz requires the Apalachicola to flow between 4,200 and 5,000 cfs in order to generate electricity. Both plants are managed by subsidiaries of the Atlanta-based Southern Company.
In the end, Stevens bombastic rhetoric may do more than inflame cross-border relations and perceptions. Coming from an Atlanta Regional Commission representative, such commentary will also continue to fuel a “Two Georgia’s” civil war over water.
-Chris Manganiello
The Most Effective Approach To Georgia’s Water Problems?
As the New Year kicks-off, it’s worth putting a critical new policy program – the Governor’s Water Supply Program – under the spotlight. The state intends to distribute $300 million over the next four years for new water ventures. Full implementation however, will take decades given the nature of eligible projects. And the environmental and financial outcomes, particularly for schemes that may never actually get finished, will be with tax payers and communities for the long haul.
In 2011, Gov. Nathan Deal directed the Georgia Environmental Finance Authority (GEFA) to produce and administer the Governor’s Water Supply Program. The Governor also pledged to set aside $300,000,000 over the next four years to fund regional water supply projects. Two-thirds of this pledge will get funneled through GEFA low-interest loans, and $100,000,000 will go to the Department of Community Affairs (DCA).
The state’s 2012 budget year called for the issue of $45,750,000 worth of general obligation bonds through DCA (grants that entail direct state investment in and ownership of projects) and GEFA (loans to local entities who will maintain ownership of these projects and have forty years to pay off the loans). GEFA has requested applications for projects and their goal is to push the first pot of gold out the door by summer 2012.
After reading Water Supply Program press releases and media coverage, “eligible” projects include wells, desalination, and other supply-side projects. But a closer reading of the Report of the Water Supply Task Force presents a reservoir-centric blueprint and financial planning process.
For example, the “Funding Overview” (Appendix D) makes it clear that the state intends to fund reservoirs and virtually no other water supply projects for the next four years. Another example: The Water Supply Program administrators are directed to evaluate and score different projects types (see Appendix F & G). New reservoir projects and enhancements are in the upper tiers followed by (and in decreasing order of preference) wells, water delivery system interconnections, indirect potable water reuse, and emerging technologies (desalination, aquifer storage and recovery, etc.).
So what are we to make of this program?
First, $300,000,000 over four years will not go very far because new reservoirs are expensive. Two proposed reservoirs in North Georgia (Dawson Forest and Glades) have a combined expected price of $950,000,000. So which proposed reservoir projects are poised to reap the Water Supply Program’s rewards? Given the realities of geography and gravity, a north Georgia reservoir project like Dawson Forest is more likely to curry GEFA’s favor. Given that Glades planners must spend more money to complete an Environmental Impact Statement, there is a high probability the money might flow to a centrally located regional project. Money could also head to Hard Labor, however geography is not on the project’s side.
Second, the program is not set up to evaluate or fund the most cost-effective methods available to local communities: conservation and efficiency projects. Georgia’s Environmental Protection Division estimates that water conservation and efficiency measures can cost $0.46 to $250 per 1,000 gallons secured while new reservoirs can cost $4,000 per 1,000 gallons secured.
Third, the other eligible projects? While interbasin transfers (IBTs) are not named as eligible projects, it’s possible that new IBTs could emerge in situations where water authorities interconnect and gain the ability to deliver treated water across basin boundaries. Also, where is the pressure to evaluate desalination coming from? This is by far the most expensive and energy intensive option on the list, but given its place on that list, is perhaps not really that popular and is actually a red herring.
Finally, we welcome the Governor’s Water Supply Program’s intention to expand and convert existing reservoirs. That would be an excellent environmental and financial investment for Georgians. As such, we would particularly like to see the state spend the $2,140,000 appropriated in the 2012 budget to study the feasibility of raising Lake Lanier’s storage by two feet. This would create over 25 billion gallons to meet the needs of downstream communities, of lake users, and for water supply much more quickly and at a lower cost than many other proposed water supply strategies. It’s certainly worth the investment to study how that particular water supply solution could benefit Georgia and its neighbors.
-Chris Manganiello
Ogeechee Update: Local officials want independent inspection of King America factory discharges
Monday night, state legislators, EPD reps, and concerned citizens met in Pooler to discuss the settlement the state reached with King America Finishing. At the meeting, five local state legislators called for independent inspection of King America’s factory discharges into the river, saying: “I think we’ve all lost confidence in the system,” and “We have to overcome that by increasing the scrutiny and the public awareness of the scrutiny.” Legislators, river-users, and a scathing Savannah Morning News editorial all called for a third-party to inspect the factory’s discharges and not leave the company in charge of monitoring itself and its pollution.
Also discussed – how King America would spend the $1 million they are required to put up for “environmental projects.” Landowner David Gay put it clearly: “We’re not looking for goods to appease the peasants, we’re looking for a clean environment.”
From the news stories it appears questions weren’t directed at the lawmakers about the role they played in the loss of “confidence in the system,” particularly the role that chronic underfunding of EPD – the agency charged with monitoring factories like King America – played in what happened.
Slap on the wrist, slap in the face
The settlement the Georgia Environmental Protection Division reached with King America Finishing was nothing more than a slap on the wrist for what is arguably one the worst environmental failures in the state history. And that translates into a slap in the face for the people who live in the Ogeechee River watershed.
Streeter cartoon: Pipe Protest | savannahnow.com#.ToHPiezRaEU.
King America was found guilty of egregious pollution of the Ogeechee River over a 5 year period which culminated in May with the largest fish kill in state history that started right below King America’s outfall pipe. In April of 2006, King America installed new production lines that put flame retardant on fabric, but they never got permission from EPD to add more pollution like formaldehyde, ammonia, sodium, and sulfide to their existing discharges into the river. What’s even more shocking, EPD inspected the plant several times since 2006 and never noticed that these new production lines were adding pollution to the river until fish started dying in May – 5 years after the fact. Local folks, including the Ogeechee Riverkeeper, who spend lots of time on the river have known something was up for years, and have been complaining. But only a massive fish kill finally got EPD’s attention.
EPD could have fined the company up to $91 million dollars, and potentially even filed criminal charges. Instead they filed no charges, levied no fines, and ordered the company to pay for $1 million in environmental projects over the next couple of years. For perspective, the city of Atlanta, in its consent decree for pollution from its outdated sewers, had to pay a fine of $2.5 million and had to pay for two environmental projects that totaled $30 million, in addition to having to pay to fix their sewers. “Environmental projects” could be any number of things, and the deal that King got from EPD wasn’t very specific, so it will likely take a lot of work from the Ogeechee Riverkeeper and locals to watchdog
the process and make sure that $1 million is actually spent and that it’s for projects that really do benefit the river.
EPD’s Director, Allen Barnes, brokered the deal. Barnes is a lawyer who was a partner in the environmental section at the King & Spalding law firm in Atlanta. He brokered the deal with King America’s attorney, Lee DeHihns, who does environmental legal work for another big Atlanta firm – Alston & Bird.
Barnes went to the DNR Board last week to get an after-the-fact blessing, presumably for cover, because he didn’t need their approval. The questions and statements DNR board members made were troubling. Board member Mabel Jenkins, who represents the Ogeechee on the board, surprisingly thanked Barnes for a balanced approach to the environment and commerce and said “I appreciate that they have their jobs. They can all get back to work.” Board Member Ray Lambert said “I don’t think it could have been handled any better.”
Those statements are surprising given that the agency they oversee missed a blatant violation of the laws they are charged with enforcing, resulting in the largest fish kill in state history. Many would have expected the board to come down hard on their top employee and ask questions about how EPD could be left unaware for 5 years that this was happening. Also, the assumption that somehow a tougher punishment for King America would somehow impact King’s ability to keep their employees working needs more back up. More questions might have been asked before professing “I don’t think it could have been handled any better” like: How much money did King America save all those years by not
installing proper waste treatment? And, what were the profits of the plant from 2006 until now?
Fortunately, other people are asking those questions – it’s the Riverkeepers and the folks of the Ogeechee. These folks know that you can protect rivers and have jobs, and that healthy rivers, corporate responsibility, and strong environmental protections are what makes a strong economy.
-April Ingle
Georgia Drought Redux: Reading Between the Lines of the News
As another Georgia summer turns to fall, low river flows and dropping reservoir levels have called to mind the late summer of 2007, when the state found itself entering a catastrophic drought.
Tropical Storm Lee brought a welcome change in the weather at the time, as the AJC reported after the storm had passed, but it was far from being a drought-breaker. Even Lake Lanier rose only an inch after the storm, according to the Gainesville Times, which also reported that the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers will continue to let the lake’s level fall in order to provide water downstream throughout the Apalachicola-Chattahoochee-Flint river system for municipal water supply, power plants, endangered species protection, recreation… you get the point.
In the Athens area, which saw barely half an inch of Lee’s tropical rains, local officials have finally decided to ask state authorities for permission to institute water-saving drought-response measures. Key word: permission. That’s because of the new system brought about by Georgia House Bill 1281 in 2008 after heavy lobbying by the “green industry,” a group of stakeholders including landscaping contractors, nurseries and other commercial horticulture business owners who fell on hard economic times during the especially dry 2007-08 season. HB 1281 was the bill that made it difficult for local jurisdictions to put water use restrictions in place that are any more stringent than the state’s. (For more background, see some of the more contemporary news still to be found online about HB 1281 here and here.)
The status of state restrictions, meanwhile, hinges on whether Georgia’s Environmental Protection Division (EPD) has declared a statewide drought status of any kind. So far this year, EPD has done no such thing. This lack of a state drought declaration is despite Gov. Nathan Deal’s recent successful request for the federal government to assist Georgia farmers who are suffering in drought conditions. (To see the Governor himself actually use the D-word, read his office’s press release here.) It is also despite the state climatologist’s Aug. 31 statement that every county in the state had entered some form of drought. (More on the state climatologist below.)
Reading between the lines of this inherent contradiction, it seems that the state’s drought management strategy is influenced much more by private-sector economic concerns than by concerns over prudent management of a public resource by community leaders and utilities. A drought-based request to the USDA brings in monetary relief for the agriculture industry, and the lack of a drought declaration at Georgia EPD means income can keep flowing into the “urban agriculture” business despite undesirable conditions in the field. (It is worth pointing out that the latter helps keep revenue flowing, too, for water utilities, which tend to experience some degree of financial stress during most droughts due to reductions in water use.)
To read even further between the lines, one can’t help but wonder where the sudden and mysterious sacking of Dr. David Stooksbury as Georgia’s state climatologist may or may not fit into the storyline of the Drought of 2011. This reading of the action on stage, as it were, is admittedly a step further than the facts at hand clearly indicate, but suffice it to say that veteran state capitol observer Tom Crawford sees plenty amiss in the Stooksbury dismissal.
Even if this year’s drought politics aren’t the unseen factor in the Stooksbury affair, cutting him out of the official loop will almost certainly erode the state’s capacity for fact-based decision-making on all kinds of weather- and climate-related conditions. As we’ve written elsewhere on the Water Wire, when it comes to water management there are already plenty of moneyed lobbies influencing state decision-making; now, we can probably only expect the trend to continue.
-Ben Emanuel
“We bought something and we can’t pay for it”
Those were the words of Canton City Councilman Bill Bryant, as quoted in Jeffry Scott’s recent AJC article. He was not talking about Social Security, Medicare, or the Pentagon’s latest weapon system. Bryant was talking about the ten-year old, incomplete, six billion gallon, and $100 million Hickory Log Creek Reservoir. Canton’s leadership is desperately trying to extract themselves from a reservoir deal-gone bad – a reservoir project that was originally only supposed to cost $20 million. The city owns a twenty-five percent stake in the water supply reservoir; the Cobb County-Marietta Water Authority owns the balance. How bad is it? Canton’s obligation (about $28 million) represents about fifty percent of city’s total debt. Or, put another way, it is “a financial disaster” according to another council member.
In a political environment dominated by purported fiscal conservatives looking to cut budgets, rein in spending, and pass balanced budget amendments, why would any Georgia community seek to build a new water supply reservoir today? The unfinished Hard Labor Creek project is already facing financial difficulties, and the planned Glades Farm Reservoir is looking at new financial hurdles.
Dollar for dollar, gallon for gallon, cheaper water supply alternatives exist for the fiscal conservative looking for economic certainty. There are options that do not put rate payers and tax payers on the hook for bond obligations communities cannot meet in the softest of real estate markets. Want some numbers on the financial folly of dams and the common sense cost-per gallon alternatives? Read Joe Cook’s (Coosa River Basin Initiative) recent Cherokee Tribune op-ed: “Dams to Nowhere.”
-Chris Manganiello
Deep Water Read: 11th Circuit Court Appeal
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit’s June 2011 finding simply concludes: the Corps misinterpreted their own authority to manage Lake Lanier and now has one year to reconsider Georgia’s past requests to draw additional water directly from the artificial reservoir. Georgia’s successful appeal of Senior U.S. District Court Judge Paul Magnuson’s 2009 ruling, however, does not end the tri-state water war or make metro Atlanta’s water problems go away. As Steve O’Day at Smith Gambrell & Russell explains, the ruling puts “extra time on the clock.”
The appeal: In my interpretation of evidence discussed in the appeal, nothing suggests that Lake Lanier was specifically authorized to supply water for City of Atlanta in the 1940s or the entire metro Atlanta region today. In fact, the appeals court’s interpretation of a thicket of Congressional testimonies, legislative authorizations, and institutional studies reads similarly to Magnuson’s order, which determined Congress primarily authorized Buford Dam for hydropower, navigation, and flood control.
New interpretive twist: The appeals court judges’ justification for the water supply authorization hangs precariously on a 1946 Corps document. In an interesting interpretation, the judges declared Buford Dam’s planned releases, as defined in Brigadier General James B. Newman’s 1946 report, eventually constituted the basis for Congress’ water supply authorization. Newman designed water releases to “insure” and “ensure” a steady water supply for the City of Atlanta’s drinking needs, and based on my reading of the document, for “sanitation,” for “public health,” and “to prevent damage to fish.” [pp. VIII, IX, and 34 for example]
Nexus: Newman also determined the dam would help regulate flows for the Georgia Power Company’s now-retired Atkinson coal-fired steam plant. A close read of Newman’s report makes it clear that his engineers calculated Buford’s releases not only for hydropower generation, but also in the context of the 1941 drought that compromised the Chattahoochee River’s flows and thus the city’s water supplies and the company’s energy-generation operations. According to the Newman Report and Atlanta Constitution articles from 1941, Atlanta residents and consumers were asked to reduce personal water and energy use “to conserve the inadequate supply” of water. Georgia, it seems, has a legacy of water scarcity that underscores the critical energy-water nexus.
Back to the appeals court’s interpretation: Because the Newman Report connected Buford’s releases with the Chattahoochee’s flows and the City of Atlanta’s water consumption, water supply was a project benefit. Therefore – but not clearly stated by the judges – the reservoir itself is available for water supply storage and purposes. It’s one of a few slippery interpretations in the ruling; one editorial goes so far as to call the appeal “judicial activism.”
Let’s backup a moment. Based on my reading of national Flood Control Act and Rivers and Harbor Act history (1930s through 1950s), the primary reason to build the nation’s hundreds of multiple purpose projects such as Buford Dam was to deliver what I call the ‘holy trinity’ of benefits: hydropower, flood control, and navigation. Irrigation was also big deal for the arid West’s constituents. The secondary – “incidental” purposes in the language of the day and in the American South – included recreation and water supply. And of course, if you read around the legislative acts and project histories – in newspapers, speeches, and correspondence – local boosters blurred the lines between the authorized, incidental, and un-authorized benefits. As such, the casual observer might have been led to believe their tax dollars were buying everything under the sun.
This is one reason I believe Congress considered Lake Lanier’s water supply an “incidental” – or secondary – benefit for Atlanta in the 1950s. Other reasons? ‘Atlanta,’ according to Newman’s report and the Metropolitan Planning Commission (predecessor to today’s Atlanta Regional Commission), constituted the City of Atlanta plus Fulton and DeKalb counties. These communities drew their water directly from the Chattahoochee River below Buford Dam. Gainesville (Hall County) and Buford (Gwinnett), which had originally drawn water from the pre-dammed Chattahoochee River, were the only two regional communities legally allowed to withdraw water directly from the new reservoir as compensation for losing their old raw water intakes to Lanier’s rising waters.
By the 1970s things changed. ‘Atlanta’ mushroomed into the ‘metro Atlanta region,’ and Gwinnett and other communities coveted Lanier’s water. Today the megalopolis includes territory governed by a dizzying number of city, county, and regional entities such as the Atlanta Regional Commission (established in 1971; ten counties today) and the Metropolitan North Georgia Water Planning District (2001; fifteen counties).
In the 1950s, when political, business, and bureaucratic operatives were advancing the dam and reservoir, did anybody really foresee the explosive and sprawling growth of the 1970s and 1980s? Probably not. But the judges insist – based on thin evidence – that Congress (circa 1951) did. Therefore, in the court’s opinion, Lanier was to serve as the region’s municipal, industrial, and commercial water cooler.
The legal battle over what constitutes the congressionally authorized purpose for Buford Dam and Lake Lanier will likely continue. Alabama’s Governor Bentley has vowed to appeal the 11th Circuit Court’s decision. If that happens, the case could be only one more decision away from heading to the U.S. Supreme Court.
-Chris Manganiello
“A small universe of people”
That’s how William Thomas “Tommy” Craig described his water supply and reservoir consulting outfit in a June 2011 AJC article. Craig’s universe has also called upon former Georgia public servants Joe Tanner (the former Department of Natural Resources commissioner) and Harold Reheis (the former Environmental Protection Division head). Combined, this universe has collected upwards of $25,000 a month from local tax coffers to help county and municipal governments navigate the permitting, engineering, and mitigation steps that can eventually lead to new water supply reservoirs (such as Glades Farm and South Fulton-Bear Creek). Craig is also under the employ of his hometown commission as a consultant for Newton County’s Bear Creek Reservoir project.
There are problems with this consulting set-up:
First, this reservoir building process can last for a decade or more and there is no guarantee a given reservoir project will ever come on line. Thus, a failed reservoir project would be costly to tax payers even if the ceremonial first silver shovel load turn-eth no red clay.
Second, Craig has the opportunity to wear two hard-hats. Under one hat, he serves on the Metropolitan North Georgia Water Planning District’s board where he guides decisions on where metro Atlanta might build new reservoirs as well as determining if the region should (or should not) pursue other water supply alternatives such as aggressive water efficiency programs. Then, under the paid-consultant’s hat, he stands the chance of winning contracts and billable hours to fulfill permitting and construction duties. How many new reservoirs have been proposed in Metro North to meet projected water supply demands? According to a related AJC story (“Water Woes; Forsyth immersed in push for reservoirs,” June 1, 2011): six new surface reservoirs.
Third, the hard sell. The related article demonstrates that some communities might fall for a consultant’s hard sell that low-balls actual reservoir construction costs. For example, the Hickory Log Creek water supply reservoir had a projected cost of $30 million when dirt started flying – the cost mushroomed to $100 million. As Forsyth Commissioner Pete Amos described his experiences with consultants, “I’m not sure” reservoir building is “as urgent for us…as it is for them.” (See June 1 AJC article)
It’s not clear what Amos exactly means, but consider this: the longer the Apalachicola-Chattahoochee-Flint tri-state water war and the Alabama-Coosa-Tallapoosa bi-state conflict drag on, the longer tax payers remain on the hook to pay eager consultants. County staff and commissions know they do not have the money to throw at expensive proposed water projects in this economy. The $46 million Governor Nathan Deal has budgeted for water projects over the next year (out of a proposed $300 million over three years) is not even enough to pay for one reservoir (e.g., seven proposed projects have a combined projected cost of $1.5 BILLION). Perhaps Deal’s money is really ‘earmarked’ for water supply project consultants? Another old tool – bonds don’t look so great with a soft bond market and few new residential customers on the horizon to pay off the new facilities. Aside from common sense water conservation and efficiency projects, wouldn’t it be sensible to focus our energy on lobbying Georgia’s elected leadership to resolve the tri-state water war and raise Lake Lanier’s pool?
When Georgia’s elected representatives continue to drag out the water wars they create uncertainty about water supply. Despite the successful 2011 appeal of Magnuson’s 2009 ruling, Gov. Deal has continued to pump uncertainty and stump for new reservoirs. This certainly looks convenient for reservoir proponents and those that stand to profit from them – the consultants, the earthmovers, and the real estate developers who might get to build homes on the shoreline. As long as there is a chance that communities might lose access to Lake Lanier or other federal reservoirs, there is a rationale to spend tax payers’ money on expensive consultants who tell us new reservoirs are the only path to water security. (Reheis even alluded to this point last year.) Uncertainty and the hard sell make the water wars good for the professional litigators and the consultants. In fiscal terms, that’s increasingly bad for tax payers, particularly those in metro Atlanta’s real estate “Ring of Death.”
-Chris Manganiello
Issue Brief: Glades Reservoir & A New Standard
Hall County’s Glades Farm Reservoir project has hit some interesting speed-bumps in the past few weeks according to the Gainesville Times’ Ashley Fielding. Over the course of five years, the project increased in scale and scope, embroiled county and city officials in a local water war, and became a favorite project of the state’s leadership. Now, Glades may symbolize a new approach to water supply planning in the state of Georgia.
Hall County recently submitted a new 404 permit to the US Army Corps of Engineers regarding the proposed Glades Reservoir project. The Corps’ response: the project will need to include an Environmental Impact Study (EIS). The Corps’ July 8, 2011 request is rare but not unprecedented. According to another Fielding article, the defunct West Georgia Regional Reservoir project sank under the combined weight of an internal re-study that found the project was too big and expensive; of a Corps required EIS; and of a looming legal suit from Alabama since the reservoir would have compromised flows in the interstate Alabama-Coosa-Tallapoosa (ACT) basin. On another occasion, the Georgia River Network and the Altamaha Riverkeeper unsuccessfully lobbied the Corps to require an EIS for the Tussahaw Reservoir in Henry County. So why the abrupt policy change?
Glades “is too controversial for a fast-track permit.” It appears the Corps wants the Glades project to set a new standard for interstate water planning. Glades is within the Apalachicola-Chattahoochee-Flint (ACF) basin, upstream of the much contested Lake Lanier, and close to the heart of the decades old Alabama, Georgia, and Florida water wars. But what will the EIS accomplish? Perhaps the Corps wants Hall County to think about Glades’ affect on the water supply and flows throughout the entire ACF basin. Maybe the Glades EIS would help the Corps assess Lake Lanier’s water supply capabilities – a task the U.S. Court of Appeals 11th Circuit recently handed-down to the Corps ten-days earlier that must be completed in one year.
It’s not entirely clear what the Corps’ motives are yet, how complex the EIS might be, or what fruit Hall County’s emerging protest will bear. Hall County commissioners and even Gov. Nathan Deal claim they have been blindsided by the EIS requirement. The Glades project, to be fair, does complicate the 11th Circuit’s instructions to the Corps. After all, the court noted in a moment of empathy while overturning the 2009 Magnuson order: “The lack of a definitive allocation of [Lake Lanier’s] storage for water supply is explained by factors beyond the agency’s control, rather than the Corps’ inaction.” (p. 48) In other words, the Corps’ lack of precision in determining Lake Lanier’s water supply authorization and allocation has been caused in part by a tangle of memorandums of agreement, legal suits, appeals, short-term water supply contracts, and new demands on the ACF’s limited water supplies by multiple states, communities, and stakeholders. This is the same ruling Gov. Deal said would bring “clarity” to the tri-state negotiations and represented a great victory for all Georgians. The court order, in my opinion, also vindicates the Corps and pushes the blame for agency “inaction” in other directions.
In the end, the water supply EIS process stands to improve stakeholder participation and the cumulative assessment of proposed reservoirs in complex working river systems.
-Chris Manganiello
For all Glades Reservoir related posts and updates, start here:
Magnuson Overturned: What Next?
Now that the dust has settled on last month’s federal appeals court ruling in the tri-state water war, it’s time to look toward what happens next (and what doesn’t).
Clearly, the tri-state negotiations go on. While the recent ruling from a three-judge panel did shift the playing field by overturning the two-year-old Magnuson ruling on use of water from Lake Lanier, it did not end the game.
This is a temporary reprieve – relieving us all of the pressure of Magnuson’s big 2012 deadline to have a tri-state agreement in hand or else revert to 1970s-era withdrawals – but it is by no means a permanent free pass, as the Southern Environmental Law Center’s Gil Rogers told the AJC at the conclusion of this story on the ruling.
Metro Atlanta still must continue striving to be a good water steward; this is important in the wider context of the water war. (In the ongoing give-and-take, that is, Georgia is most likely not done giving.) More specifically, don’t forget that there’s another whole phase in the tri-state litigation that’s still pending. Endgame this is not.
Meanwhile, the two most obvious, cost-effective solutions for Metro Atlanta’s future water supply remain the same. First, Georgia must undertake a vigorous effort at water conservation and efficiency. Second is fully examining Lake Lanier’s allocation and its storage capacity, including perhaps raising the full pool level there. These two approaches in combination can lead to what’s needed by all the players in the tri-state conflict (Georgia communities included): a lasting solution rooted in water conservation and healthy river flows to protect fish, wildlife, recreation, communities and economies throughout the ACF and ACT river basins, as well as metro Atlanta’s drinking water.
But one thing is apparent for the short term: a pressure-release valve has been opened. Judge Magnuson’s deadline of July 2012 has vanished, so there’s no need for Georgia utilities to rush headlong into expensive infrastructure solutions aimed at filling the supply gap they would face next year if Magnuson had stood.
Need an example of why that’s important? Take a look at this Gainesville Times story. “The ruling also gives area leaders pause on plans for a water treatment plant at the Cedar Creek Reservoir,” writes the Times’ Jeff Gill, who quotes City of Gainesville utility director Kelly Randall thusly:
“I feel confident that the construction phase [at Cedar Creek]… will be put off,” Randall said. “It had been scheduled to begin late this fall, but with the availability of water from Lake Lanier, there’s no reason to move forward with it sooner rather than later.”
Clearly there are still a lot of questions to answer as the tri-state dispute moves forward. But the decisions that still lie ahead in Georgia will be all the more prudent if the Appeals Court panel’s decision means our leaders can’t rush into unwise, unsustainable, expensive new water-supply projects, using the convenient excuse of a looming deadline to put taxpayers and ratepayers at considerable financial risk.
-Ben Emanuel
For a deep read on the appeal documentation, check out Chris Manganiello’s Georgia Water Wire post.
