LINCOLN, Neb.—Nebraska officials will likely face additional court battles if they try to limit groundwater irrigation near the Republican River to conserve water, a state lawmaker says.
The state is already mired in litigation, and a lingering drought has raised concerns about whether Nebraska will have enough water to meet its obligations.
Access to the Republican River’s water is spelled out in a 1943 compact involving Colorado, Nebraska and Kansas. The agreement allocates 49 percent of the river’s water to Nebraska, 40 percent to Kansas and 11 percent to Colorado.
Earlier this year, the Nebraska Department of Natural Resources ordered the release of water from four reservoirs in the Republican River Basin to keep the state in compliance with the Republican River Compact, a move that alarmed surface-water irrigators. State Sen. Mark Christensen of Imperial told the Lincoln Journal Star ( ) he was confident that more lawsuits will come if the state restricts irrigation, as many expect will happen.
Kansas has long accused Nebraska of violating the 1943 compact by allowing farmers to divert more than their legal share for private use. Kansas has said Nebraska has allowed the proliferation and use of thousands of wells hydraulically connected to the river and its tributaries, thus depleting the river’s flow.
The state already has been sued by Kansas over use of the Republican River.
Another lawsuit filed by two groups of irrigators is challenging a plan to pump groundwater into the river to comply with the compact. Christensen, a leading water expert in the Legislature, said he doubts that lawsuit will get settled out of court.
When lawmakers convene in January for the 2014 session, they will begin second-round debate on a bill that would compensate farmers when Nebraska limits or shuts off irrigation in the Republican River Basin.
It would direct $10 million to pay surface-water irrigators as much as $150 an acre per year for two years as compensation for the loss of water. Of that, $6.6 million would come from a fund the Legislature has been paying into since 2007 — the last time the state paid irrigators for water sent to Kansas. The other $3.4 million would be new spending from the general fund.
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The bill is LB522
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Information from: Lincoln Journal Star,
