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Water Rules Are Official's Last Act

Posted on: Monday, 22 August 2005, 18:00 CDT

On his last day on the job Friday, Roger Patterson approved rules the state will use when making its annual designation of which river basins have water that is fully spoken for.

As director of the Nebraska Department of Natural Resources for six years, Patterson helped craft a law designed to help the state better manage both its surface water and underground water.

That law, approved last year, requires the department to annually assess the water supply in each river basin.

It's an attempt to prevent the types of overdevelopment and shortages in the growing Omaha and Lincoln areas, for example, that could spawn water restrictions.

"The whole idea is to start planning before we're in trouble,'' said Ann Bleed, the department deputy director who becomes acting director.

"It's a lot easier to tell a new (water) user that they're not going to use as much water as they hoped, versus telling an existing user that they have to cut back,'' she said.

The most controversial element of the rule is the standard the department will use to define boundaries of a fully appropriated basin, where the state and local natural resources districts will jointly manage water.

The agency will use a stricter formula than the state's natural resources districts wanted to define the area in which surface water and underground water are connected. -- David Hendee

Source: Omaha World - Herald

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