Sens. Shelby, Rubio resume water war with Georgia
WASHINGTON – An interstate battle over water resources re-emerged in Congress this week when senators from Alabama and Florida teamed up against Georgia to protect downstream water levels in shared river basins.
Sen. Richard Shelby, R-Ala., has added a provision to a federal spending bill that would require the Justice Department to audit how often in the last 11 years a community withdrew more water from a reservoir than a contract allowed.
Separately, Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., wants to block the use of federal funds for any effort to reallocate water resources without consent from all three governors.
The two proposals show the states’ 25-year-old water wars are far from settled. The three states have battled over how much water the Atlanta area should be allowed to use, and how that affects people and industries in Alabama and Florida.
Alabama says Georgia communities have violated water contracts without consequence, which is why Shelby wants the federal government to come up with a better enforcement plan.
“Any water authority in compliance with the terms of its storage contract should not be concerned about the disclosure of this information,” said Torrie Matous, a Shelby spokeswoman.
Rubio, who wants to attach his proposal to a different spending bill, is specifically concerned about Apalachicola Bay and the seafood industry it supports.
“I have long supported the role governors play in water allocation when the water in question greatly impacts multiple states,” Rubio said on the Senate floor Thursday. “However, absent such an agreement between governors, water continues to be withheld and the situation has now become dire in my home state of Florida.”
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Sen. Johnny Isakson, R-Ga., opposes both proposals.
“The federal appropriations spending process is not the correct forum to resolve disputes among these states, and Georgia has been working in good faith for years to resolve these disputes while also remaining focused on continued conservation efforts to be good stewards of the water resources in these basins,” said Isakson spokeswoman Amanda Maddox.
The Alabama-Coosa-Tallapoosa River Basin starts in north Georgia and flows through central and southwest Alabama. Lake Allatoona is at the top of the basin, which supports dams, lakes, rivers and streams throughout most of central Alabama, including Montgomery. The state has argued for years that the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, which operates the federal reservoir, is too stingy releasing water during dry periods and too deferential to metro Atlanta’s drinking water needs.
The Apalachicola-Chattahoochee-Flint River Basin also starts in north Georgia. It runs near the border with Alabama and into northwest Florida, where oyster harvests have suffered from inadequate fresh water.
“The bottom line is that the status quo is only working for one state,” Rubio said. “I, along with the senior senator from Florida (Democrat Bill Nelson) and our colleagues from Alabama, have stood lockstep to bring our respective states to the table to finalize water allocations that will take into account our shared goals.”
Contact Mary Troyan atmtroyan@usatoday.com