Editorial: Another reason to be skeptical of water group

October 7, 2009
By Dan Chapman | The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Each time Georgia proposes damming the Chattahoochee, Etowah or Tallapoosa rivers, or any of their tributaries, Florida and Alabama unleash a torrent of lawsuits and bureaucratic protests to kill the proposed reservoir.

And metro Atlanta, in desperate need of more water, loses virtually every time.

Yet Gov. Sonny Perdue and a task force of business, government and environmental officials unveiled a new strategy Wednesday to circumvent downstream opposition and ensure Atlanta’s future access to the most precious of commodities.

One controversial, yet bountiful water resource lies east of Atlanta. The task force is expected to investigate tapping rivers and reservoirs outside the Chattahoochee River basin. First up: Walton County’s proposed Hard Labor Creek regional reservoir, which dams the Apalachee River.

Perdue’s 80-member water “contingencies” task force met at the Governor’s Mansion to begin hashing out myriad water conservation and storage scenarios to help insulate the Atlanta from drought and peevish judges. By year’s end, the panel will recommend to Perdue a slew of legislative remedies, some quite costly, to bolster the region’s water supply and prospects for future growth and development.

The timing is critical: A federal judge ruled in July that metro Atlanta illegally taps Lake Lanier. Atlanta has less than three years to mollify Senior U.S. District Judge Paul Magnuson and get Congress to bless an equitable distribution of the Chattahoochee River between Georgia, Alabama and Florida.

The clock is ticking.

“Judge Magnuson himself said it was a ‘draconian’ order,” said Tim Lowe, task force co-chair and CEO of Lowe Engineers. “But the judge’s ruling provided a catalyst for action, and that forces everybody to come to the table and make decisions that ordinarily might not be made.”

The task force represents the fourth piece of Perdue’s multipronged approach to keep Atlanta wet. He’ll appeal Magnuson’s ruling. He hopes to negotiate directly with his Alabama and Florida counterparts. And he has tapped Georgia’s congressional delegation to seek authorization to continue using Lanier.

Perdue’s “four-pronged approach is right on target. The focus of the task force is really to do what we can to outline alternatives to put in place over the next three years,” said John Brock, task force co-chairman and CEO of Coca-Cola Enterprises. “This is a critical opportunity.”

Water “conservation, capture and control” are the group’s mandates. They’ll weigh requirements that developers install low-flow toilets and water meters for every apartment and residence. Fixing the metro region’s antiquated, leaky water delivery system can greatly reduce water loss.

“Conservation is the cheapest and most effective way to [guarantee] change,” said Pierre Howard, a task force member and former lieutenant governor. “It will help us with the courts, Congress and our state neighbors in negotiations if we demonstrate that we’re excellent stewards of water.”

Capturing water involves building new reservoirs and filling unused quarries. Adding a couple of feet of concrete and steel to the tops of the reservoirs at Lanier and Allatoona would translate into millions of additional gallons of water. Pumping excess water, like the downpours that have inundated Atlanta in the past month, into underground aquifers could provide rainy-day storage.
Costs, though, could be prohibitive. The yet-to-open Hickory Log Creek Reservoir in Canton, for example, cost more than $100 million. And leaky state finances – Perdue slashed the budget this year, including a $40 million reservoir-building account – could thwart construction.

Legislators have repeatedly balked on conservation measures that would drive up the costs of construction.

“I’ve noticed in 30 years of dealing with the Legislature that crisis effects change and there’s an atmosphere of crisis around the water issue,” said Howard, president of the Georgia Conservancy.
“Control” is the task force’s trickiest political, environmental and financial hurdle. In essence, members will weigh the possibility of transferring North Georgia water to where it’s most needed – metro Atlanta. Already, the anti-Atlanta knives are being sharpened.

“That’s just going to be politically very difficult in the Legislature,” said Neill Herring, a lobbyist for the Sierra Club who was not invited to join the task force. “People of Georgia are very awake to this issue. They’ve instructed their legislators in no uncertain terms that they don’t want their water going to metro Atlanta.”

Perdue, in an interview soon after Magnuson’s July ruling, said that transferring water to Atlanta “is an appropriate discussion going forward” and that so-called inter-basin transfers shouldn’t be “a forbidden fruit forever.”

State law forbids water from outside the 15-county Metropolitan North Georgia Water Planning District from being pumped back into the district, which includes Atlanta, Cobb, DeKalb, Gwinnett and Fulton counties. And Florida and Alabama legally contest virtually every proposed reservoir that could impede North Georgia river flows. So Atlanta, basically, can’t build any new reservoirs.

But if a reservoir is built outside the water district, in Walton County for example, then metro Atlanta could conceivably tap the planned Hard Labor Creek reservoir and ship the water to Gwinnett.

“That will be a very important piece of whatever solution the task force arrives at simply because, strategically, you might not need any input from other states,” said Tommy Craig, a Covington attorney and task force adviser who handles water permits for North Georgia municipalities. “It would be best to change the law to recognize the need to import water” into Atlanta.

Walton officials spoke with Perdue’s chief of staff last month about shipping water to Gwinnett, which stands to be hurt bad if Magnuson’s ruling stands. Hard Labor Creek, when it’s completed in a couple of years, could provide 41 million gallons of water daily (mgd) to Walton and Oconee counties. Yet they only need 6-8 mgd for the foreseeable future.

Walton expects to spend $100 million to build its reservoir; another $50 million or so would expand it enough to slake some of Gwinnett’s needs, according to Kevin Little, chairman of the Walton County Board of Commissioners.”

“So if we could get this built out on somebody else’s dollars, that would be an advantage to our taxpayers,” Little said. “We’ve offered to be a crutch for Gwinnett and the metro area because we know what happens if the judge’s ruling stands.”

Options for task force

Gov. Sonny Perdue’s “contingencies” task force will likely investigate the following water conservation and storage measures:

• Build new regional reservoirs.
• Raise height of dams at lakes Lanier and Allatoona.
• Tap reservoirs or rivers outside Atlanta’s water planning district.
• Fill quarries.
• Pump excess water into the aquifer.
• Reuse treated wastewater.
• Plug leaks in water distribution system.
• Require new buildings to use low-flow toilets.
• Rebates for water-saving systems.
• Water meters for apartments and all residences.