WSP06607

• File Number: 8029
• Description: Section D General Correspondence - Colorado Agencies
• State: CO
• Basin: Statewide
• Date: 12/1/1960
• Author: Miller and Chutkow
• Title: Report on Ground Water Problems and Recommendations for Further Study and Legislative Consideration
• Water Supply Pro - Doc Type: Report/Study

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OUTLINE OF AMERICAN EXPEftlENCE IN GROUND WATER

By

C.

*
E. Busby

.,

Experience tells me to approach ground water management problems
with real caution and to give special attention to the geology and soils of the
area, the nature and extent of the water supply, the present and prospec-
tive uses, and the legal and political background of the State. It is a
problem in social engineering to use the terms coined by Roscoe Pound.
I shall talk about ground water in this setting.

,

In the case of the High Plains of Texas, the groundwater body is
a vast sheet of water under a blanket of sedimentary rocks, without appre-
ciable natural replenishment from precipitations or high snow sources.
In the sense of a sheet, this is like the Ogallala formations in Colorado
and the St. Peter and Dakota sandstones in the Plains. But in terms of
natural replenishment and artesian pressures, it is not. So the supply
in the Texas area is a "wasting asset, " mined as if it were an ore body
(unless some remote and feasible possibility of artificial replenishment
develops in the future). The users are conservative in the ir attitude
toward property rights, so change from the very conservative common
law rules toward the most progressive statutory controls is presently
impractical.

Thus, the local groundwater district laws of Texas~ / seek mainly
to reduce water waste and to control the spacing of wells affecting
drawdown. These involve land use and conservation practices. This
general method has real educational and teChnical-guidance value and
places individual and group responsibility near home.

The life of the ground water reservoir supply is limited and the
irrigated area will probably revert to grazing-dry farming in a century.
But in the meantime, the landowners and users can work together to
manage efficiently their common water resource. Here the water con-
servation and soil conservation districts can combine their powers and
facilities, as they are now doing.

-'

"

*
Water Program Specialist, Soil Conservation Service, U. S. Department
of Agriculture.

1/ Tex. Rev. Civ. Stat. Ann. (Vernon, Supp. 1953) art. 7880-3c;
Proceedings, Water Law Conferences, Nov. 1952, June 1954.