Saturday, April 25, 2009
Groundwater district declines Rose's bill and offers a substitute with major concessions
Editor's Note: The RoundUp Friday received a copy of the letter below from Andrew Backus, board president of the Hays Trinity Groundwater Conservation District. Updates on the progress of legislation for the groundwater district will be provided as they become available. The mission of the district, in short, is to preserve and protect the groundwater resources in western Hays County. The board is made up of 5 representatives elected by voters in the region.
For a map of the district and more information on its activities, follow this link: haysgroundwater.com
Send your comments to online.editor@valleyspringcomm.net or to Mr. Backus at aback@austin.rr.com
Dear Senator Wentworth, Representative Rose and Staff,
We appreciate your continued willingness to work with us to resolve the many issues facing the District. As you pointed out, your predecessor’s legislation significantly hampers the District’s ability to do its job under State law.
The input we have received since S.B. 2530 and H.B. No. 4796 were filed makes it clear there is significant opposition across a broad spectrum of our constituents. Therefore, rather than risk increased animosity we prefer not to pursue that option at this time.
Instead we offer the attached proposed committee substitute. The substitute is based on the last draft bill we provided to you in February, but makes several important concessions to those who have voiced opposition to bringing HTGCD up to the level of other GMA-9 districts.
First, it removes all powers of eminent domain authority. Second, it limits the ability of the district to enter property to inspect exempt wells. Third, it limits any property taxes authorized at a property tax election to no more than 5 cents per $100 valuation. Fourth, it makes clear that metering an exempt well is an owner decision. Finally, we add limitations on the fee rates the district may charge for new wells, new water taps, transferred well ownership and transferred water taps.
The recommendations we make to you are the result of a Board decision at the HTGCD’s April 23, 2009 Board meeting and are based upon thousands of hours of volunteer time of professional experts on and off the board, and meetings with stakeholders, county, regional and state officials.
The HTGCD board has served the community with the highest degree of integrity, transparency and professionalism for more than 6-years. We believe our proposed legislation is a good and necessary compromise that adequately addresses all the objections to prior versions but allows the District to protect well owners and to operate according to State law, and we look forward to your support in filing this as a substitute to your bill.
Greg Ellis, District Counsel, will provide a revised bill analysis by this afternoon.
Sincerely,
Andrew H. Backus
Board President
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
3 comments:
Like the proverbial ten lawyers buried up to their necks in sand, it's "a good start." But there's no way of getting around the fact that it's still the camel's nose under the tent.
A better analogy might be the question of "how to boil a frog"; Answer: one degree at a time.
In this case the frog is us--district landowners with wells, and the right of capture. Two years from now there will be new and stricter provisions; two years after that, the same thing, and two years after that the same thing. Until we wind up ten years from now with, among other things, a new taxing authority, new taxes, loss of control over who has access to our property, and increasing restrictions on our right of capture.
All administered by, very possibly, HTGCD directors who aren't as professional as the current group. Or, worse, have a separate agenda from groundwater conservation, like "no-growth".
"No taxes" and "pro-growth", the new mantras for love starved conservatives. Does everything with the word "planning" in it have to mean socialist or anti-growth? It is these two narrow focused talking points that got us eight years of George W. Bush and the current US economy. Planned growth done by smart people is the only thing that works. Someday Wimberley will finally decide to elect those people.
Is there no one out there paying attention to what's goin' on here?
Water is our life's blood and it is being held ransom by politicians and LANDowners! And those who are trying to make the HTGCD work for everyone now and in the future are being bullied into making concession after concession after concession. Times they are 'achangin' and there won't be anything to fight over once the water is gone!! Then what?? And what else is Rose and his compadres working on behind behind our backs to throw the constituency under the bus...more smoke to cover the real issue. Keep on looking cuz there's way more to this story!!
Post a Comment