LITTLE ROCK — When the Arkansas Natural Resources Conservation Commission unveiled a proposed state water plan more than 20 years ago, it sparked opposition from environmental groups who said it didn’t do enough to protect rivers and farmers who objected to any attempt to restrict the use of groundwater for irrigation.
As the commission prepares to update the plan, which was last revised in 1990, it’s hoping for a different reaction, said Edward Swaim, chief of the commission’s Water Resources Management Division.
“This is more collaboration on the front end, so that when we get to that rulemaking process, we’ll have very few people, I hope, who willsay, ‘Well, this is the first time I’ve seen this, and I don’t like it,’” Swaim said.
Swaim spoke Wednesday to representatives of utilities, state agencies, environmental and agricultural groups and others who gathered at the University of Arkansas Cooperative Extension Service headquarters in Little Rock to discuss preparations for updating the plan, which sets out state policies and goals for protecting and managing the state’s rivers, lakes and underground water sources.
The recommendations in the current plan included establishing conservation programs and diverting water from rivers to irrigate farmland in areas of eastern Arkansas where groundwater supplies are dwindling.
The plan led to expandedstate financing for water and wastewater projects, and a law allowing the commission, under certain circumstances, to restrict groundwater use in areas that have a critical shortage. The commission has never used the authority, however, Swaim said.
Updating the plan will involve analyzing data that has been collected during the past 20 years to plan for thestate’s water needs through 2050, Swaim said.
During this year’s session, the state Legislature appropriated $4 million for the effort. The update is scheduled to be complete by November 2014.
On Wednesday, the 80 participants met in groups with representatives of consulting firms CDM Smith of Cam-bridge, Mass., and engineering firm FTN Associates LTD of Little Rock to voice their opinions about what the plan should include.
The commission is to consider the comments in developing its plan for the update. An outline on the scope of the update will be presented to the Legislative Council for approval next month.
Debbie Doss, chairman of the Arkansas Conservation Coalition, said environmental groups have been pushing for the water plan to be updated to reflect developments, such as drilling for natural gas in the Fayetteville Shale in northcentral Arkansas, a process that involves large amounts of water.
Doss said the state also needs better information about how much water can be pulled from a stream without harming aquatic life.
“There’s a potential to take water from streams and cause irreparable damage, but we don’t know what the limits are,” Doss said.
Dennis Carman, chief engineer and director of the White River Irrigation District, said he’s hoping the plan will help spur support for a project that will divert water from the White River to irrigate farmland in Arkansas, Jefferson, Lonoke, Prairie and Pulaski counties.
The project was stalled for years by a lawsuit by the Arkansas Wildlife Federation and the National Wildlife Federation, which claimed that the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service didn’t conduct a thorough-enough investigation before determining that the project wouldn’t adversely affect the habitat of the ivory-billed woodpecker.
The lawsuit was dismissed in 2008, but the project has been slowed since then because of a lack of federal funding. It’s expected to cost $450 million when complete but received only $592,000 during the federal fiscal year that ends Sept. 30.
“We believe that if everyone understands the process and the fact that we all need to work together, we don’t have anything here that’s not solvable,” Carman said.
Arkansas, Pages 9 on 07/26/2012