More Texas Water Rights Voices
Category: News Commentary...
Posted Friday, May 21, 2004 at 09:10 AM [GMT-6]

Kenneth Schustereit left a comment on a previous post to let me know that west Texans aren't the only ones in a battle to protect private groundwater supplies. The folks in south Texas -- Victoria, Goliad and Refugio counties, to be exact -- are engaged in the same kind of fight.

Kenneth has a website devoted to the issue as it affects those localities. Among other things, the website documents the flaws in the current regulations concerning the establishment of Water Conservation Districts (eg. the ability of the state to override local decisions). They also face some problems that we generally don't, such as management of rivers (we should be so fortunate)...but we all share the same fundamental concern: who owns and controls the water under privately-owned land, and how are those ownership rights best protected to ensure that we all have enough water in the future?

Is anyone optimistic about the ability of most of the state to avoid being eventually sucked dry by the demands of the three megaplexes?