Oklahomans For Responsible Water Policy

...science and sustainability for future generations.

U.S. Geological Survey Authorizes Approximately $6 Million For Multi-Year Scientific Study of Red River Watershed Basin

October 8, 2014

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact: State Sen. Jerry Ellis
Valliant: (580) 933-4930
Contact: State Rep. Curtis McDaniel
Capitol: (405) 557-7363

 

U.S. Geological Survey Authorizes Approximately $6 Million

For Multi-Year Scientific Study of Red River Watershed Basin

 

OKLAHOMA CITY – At least in part because of a measure endorsed by the Oklahoma Legislature earlier this year, a federal agency has earmarked approximately $6 million for a multi-year analysis of the Red River watershed basin.

Dr. William J. Andrews, director of the U.S. Geological Society’s Oklahoma Water Science Center, announced Tuesday that the USGS “will be funding the Red River Focus Area project…”

Senate Concurrent Resolution 32, which was adopted in March by both the House and the Senate without dissent, recommended a comprehensive analysis of the river basin.

In the resolution, Texas, Arkansas and Louisiana were encouraged to join Oklahoma in urging Congress to direct the U.S. Geological Survey to undertake a “master multi-state study” of the Red River and its watershed basin.

The purpose would be to calculate the quantity and quality of water flows along the entire upper, middle and lower Red River and throughout the entire 65,590 square-mile watershed basin, which is primarily in Oklahoma and Texas but also parts of Arkansas and Louisiana.

The river extends more than 1,100 miles, from the Texas Panhandle near Hollis, Okla., southeasterly to its terminus above Baton Rouge, La. The river is Oklahoma’s southern border with Texas for 517 river miles, records reflect.

USGS offices in Oklahoma, Louisiana, Arkansas and Texas will share $1.5 million over three years, fiscal years 2016-18, allocated from WaterSMART program funding, Andrews said.

(The WaterSMART program, which was established in 2010, allows all bureaus of the U.S. Department of the Interior to work with states, Native American tribes, local governments, and non-governmental organizations to pursue a sustainable water supply for the nation. The program establishes a framework to provide federal leadership and assistance on the efficient use of water, integrating water and energy policies to support the sustainable use of all natural resources, and coordinating the water conservation activities of the various Interior offices.)

Besides the WaterSMART funds, the USGS will receive $40,000 to underwrite planning efforts in FY 2015 for the Red River project. The USGS also hopes to secure $195,050 in funding from other sources “for stream ecology and ecological flow work” along the Red River, Andrews reported.

The agency also is allocating approximately $3,150,000 for stream gauges and other projects on the river, and the newly approved study “will add about $500,000 to that annual total for a few years,” Andrews said.

“This project does not entirely fulfill the goals” recommended in SCR 32, but it “should answer some of the important questions,” Andrews wrote.

The resolution was drafted by Tulsa geologist Bob Jackman and was introduced in the Legislature by two southeastern Oklahoma lawmakers: Sen. Jerry Ellis, D-Valliant, and Rep. Curtis McDaniel, D-Smithville. The resolution, along with “quite a few” letters of support, “probably improved the chances of this project being funded,” Andrews informed Jackman.

Previous surveys of the river were conducted in the early 1970s, SCR 32 relates. Updating that data would be of “great benefit” to all citizens in the river’s watershed because it would provide scientific answers to questions such as:

• Is surplus water available for transfer from the middle Red River basin area?

• If so, where, when, and in what quantities?

• What are the causes and effects of natural and man-made water pollution and salinity in the Red River?

• What are current and future beneficial uses of surface and interconnected groundwaters in the four states in the river’s watershed basin? For example, Oklahoma tributaries of the Red River include Cache Creek, the Salt Fork, the North Fork, Muddy Boggy Creek, the Washita River, Little River and the Kiamichi River.

The findings of the proposed study should “greatly assist” all four states in “smarter water management and ecological protection, especially during years of recurring droughts,” the resolution contends.

A scientific accounting of the water that flows into the Red River also could help ameliorate disputes such as the lawsuit that Tarrant Regional Water District lodged against the Oklahoma Water Resources Board in 2007. The water district wanted to buy “surplus” water from Oklahoma, but Oklahoma lawmakers enacted legislation that effectively barred the out-of-state sale of water originating in this state.

The U.S. Supreme Court ruled unanimously in favor of Oklahoma in an opinion announced on June 13, 2013.

A Red River Compact finalized in 1980 and approved by Congress apportions the water of the river basin among the four states. “To ensure that its apportionments are honored, the Compact includes an accounting provision, but an accounting is not mandatory until one or more affected states deem the accounting necessary,” the Justices ruled. “…the Compact does not require ongoing monitoring or accounting,” they added.

“This is because the ‘extensive gauging and record keeping required’ to carry out such an accounting would impose ‘a significant financial burden on the involved states’,” the Supreme Court wrote. “Given these costs, the signatory States did not envision that it would be undertaken as a routine matter… Indeed, it appears that no State has ever asked for such an accounting in the Compact’s history.”

The Compact imposes a 25 percent cap on each state’s access to excess water in the river’s subbasin 5, Tarrant Regional Water District pointed out.

If Texas believes that Oklahoma “is using more than its 25 percent allotment and wishes to stop it from doing so, then it may call for an accounting … and, depending on the results of that accounting, insist that Oklahoma desist from taking more than its provided share,” the Justices declared.

“A study in which scientific data is collected, based on a thorough analysis of the watershed, is long overdue and well-deserved,” McDaniel said. “It’s been over 40 years since a study was performed on the quality and quantity of water along the entire length of the Red River,” Ellis noted.

Updated: June 3, 2017 — 2:00 pm
Oklahomans For Responsible Water Policy © 2016