(IMPERIAL REPUBLICAN) The Imperial Republican reports, "Areas of the Upper Republican Natural Resources District where groundwater declines have occurred would be in the cross hairs of a bill introduced last week by Sen. Tom Carlson of Holdrege. Areas with a 20 percent decline in the saturated thickness of the aquifer since 1963 would receive only 50 percent of the allotted irrigation allocation. Areas with a 30 percent decline in the same time frame would be shut down under the proposed legislation. Box Butte County in western Nebraska would also be heavily affected by the proposed legislation. Another proposed bill by Carlson, under the share and share alike groundwater policy, could force all irrigators to have the same allocation, even if that meant zero. Normally, Sen. Mark Christensen of Imperial and Sen. Carlson work together on water issues in the Republican Basin. But these two bills, LB 1054 and LB 1056, have put the two senators on opposite sides of the fence."
Read the article here.
