0529071.6
COMMISSIONERS' COURT AGENDA REQUEST
PLEASE FURNLSH ONE ORIGINAL AND NINE COPIES OF THIS REQUEST
AND DOCUMENTS TO BE REVIEWED BY THE COURT.
MADE BY: Commissioner Williams OFFICE: Precinct 2
MEETING DATE: May 29, 2007 TIME PREFERRED:
SUBJECT: (Please be specific). Consider, discuss and take appropriate action to
Examine County's ability to obtain groundwater pumping rights from HGCD for all
property/easements owned by Kerr County.
EXECUTIVE SESSION REQUESTED:
NAME OF PERSON(S) ADDRESSING THE COURT: Commissioners Williams.
ESTIMATED LENGTH OF PRESENTATION:
IF PERSONNEL MATTER-NAME OF EMPLOYEE:
Time for submitting this request for Court to assure that the matter is posted in
accordance with Title 5, Chapter 551 and 552, Government Code, is as follows:
Meeting scheduled for Mondays: 5:00 P.M. previous Tuesday
THIS REQUEST RECEIVED BY:
THIS REQUEST RECEIVED
All Agenda Requests will be screened by the County Judge's Office to determine if adequate
information bas been prepared for the Court's formal consideration and action at time of Court
meetings. Your cooperation is appreciated and contributes toward your request being addressed
at the eazliest opportunity. See Agenda Request Rule adopted by Commissioners Court.
Agenda Item Backup Statement
See attached article from May 14, 2007, Express-News re Guadalupe County's
action to establish pumping rights from all property/easements owned by the County.
Is this something we should pursue?
SAN ANTOMO
EXPRESS-NEWS A 1~ T~ l
MoNnnY C~~,1.1(~I J`
MAY 14, 2007 `-'' `[~~ `'(,~,'
SECTION B l V l.:i~~ ~.J
Q & A with new TYC ombudsman ~`"
Will Harrell, former executive director of ACLU's Texas
branch and recent hire as new TYC ombudsman, tallcs''•
about representing incarcerated youths.
PAGE 56
"I can't find anything in the law that says the county does not have the authority to do this."
GUADALUPE COUNTY COMMISSIONER 11M WOLVERTON
Guadalupe sees cash in water rights
In unusual plan, county could claim them from
conservation district, lease them to cities.
BY ROGER GROTEAU
E%PRE55-NEWS STAFF WRITER
SEGUIN - A Guadalupe
Cotmty commissioner thinks he
has found a novel way to pro-
vide hundreds of acre-feet of wa-
ter to Schertz and Seguin resi-
dents and give county govern-
ment anew source of revenue.
If the county moves forward
with the idea, it could be a
groundbreaking option for
Texas counties, cities and mu-
nicipal utility districts to gain
pumping rights from grotmdwa-
ter districts and make money by
leasing the water rights for
property the county owns, in-
cluding long stretches of county
roads.
The south side of Guadalupe
County is over the Carrizo-Wil-
cox Aquifer, and the Guadalupe
County Groundwater Conserva-
tion District is responsible for
granting pumping tights for
that water. The district's rules
award pumping rights based
upon the amount of land the ap-
plicant owns and the thickness
of the saturated sands in the
aquifer below that land.
County Commissioner Jim
Wolverton recently realized the
county itself owns a lot of land
over the aquifer in the form of
county roads. He conservatively
estimated that the county's
right-of-way ownership in the
district adds up to more than
1,400 acres.
That could entifle the county
to more than 350 acre-feet a year
of pumping rights, said Kelly
McDermott, geographic informa-
tion systems analyst for the
groundwater district. Assuming
an average aquifer thickness of
300 feet below the county roads,
the county could get the right to
pump about one-fourth of an
acrefoot of water per yeaz for
every acre of right of way it
owns, she said.
McDermott said she spoke to
a representative of the Guada-
lupe County Road Department
on Wednesday and will work
with the department to deter-
mine how much water the
county has the right to pump.
"I don't think we have a prob-
lem with that," she said. "If the
courity owns the land, it owns
the ptunping rights. If they can
See GUADALUPE/58
Guadalupe may set precedent 1
CONTINUED FROM 78
come up with a number we can
verify, who's Yo say they can't
Pump.'
Wolverton said he would like
to lease those pumping rights
to the Schertz-Seguin Local
Government Corp., an entity
set up by the two cities that
drilled eight wells in Gonzales
County and built a 50-mile pipe-
line to bring almost 13,000-acre-
feet of water annually to Gua-
dalupe County.
Wolverton said the water
rights should lease for about
$92 an acre-foot, or about
$32;000 a year or more, depend-
ing on the amount of right of
way the county owns and the
amount of pumping rights that
total of land gives the county.
"I can't fmd anything in the
law that says the county does
not have the authority to do
this," Wolverton said- "I'd like
the county to look into this. It
would benefit both the cities.
They need water. The water is
there and somebody is going to
get paid for it "
The Commissioners Court
reached a cronsensus Tuesday to
research the issue further.
Such a plan would not work
in Bexar County or other coun-
ties that are part of the Ed-
wards Aquifer Authority,
which does not award pumping
rights based upon the amount
of land an applicant owns.
"It sounds like he's come up
with something outside the
boa," said Doug Miller, chair-
man of the EAA board of direc-
tors and a member of the South
Central Texas Regional Water
Planning Group. "That just
might work."
Miller said the move is not
necessarily a cause for alarm,
but it bears watching.
"Somebody may challenge it,
or maybe not, and then you'll
have a precedent," Miller said.
"If it works for Guadalupe
County, you could see a ]ot of
other public entities, in dis-
tricts with rules like that, do
the same thing."
Tony Wilenchik, a Schertz
city councilman, said the pros-
pect of adding to the city water
supply constitutes "a win-win
situation for Schertz, Seguin
and the county"
The neighboring Gonzales
County Underground Water
Conservation ~ District also
awards Pumping permits based
on the amount of land owned,
said Manager Barry Miller.
"That's an interesting
scheme, a very interesting con-
cept," he said of Wolverton's
idea. "It's not addressed in the
rules of out district."
He said district rules require
permitted. wells to be drilled at
least 500 feet from the property
line, which could preclude drill-
ing a well on a county road
right of way But the county
could feasibly buy a parcel of
land on a county road and con-
sider that parcel and all the
roads in the district as one con-
tiguous parcel.
Small wells, including those
used by homeowners, do not
need to be permitted in the
Guadalupe County district.
Texas Commission on Envi-
ronmental Quality spokeswo-
man Andrea Morrow said she
checked with lawyers and staff
at the commission and no one
had heard of another county
that has claimed pumping
rights based on ownership of
rights of way in a groundwater
conservation district
"We can't say defmitively
that no other counties have
done this, but we don't know of
any," she said.
Texas has 80 such groundwa-
ter districts. Some, like the
Guadalupe County district,
award pumping rights based on
land ownership. Others base it
on historical use, rate of with-
drawal, prevention of harm to
neighboring wells or other
rules.
The Edwards Aquifer Au-
thority bases its permits on his-
torical use and requires propor-
tionate reduction in pumping
during times of drought.
rcroteau~xpress-neius.net