 If you have a fear that you're going to have a problem with water quality, water quantity. A whole lot of big cities in the state of Texas that are growing at tremendous rates. Growth is water demand. And they're going to go somewhere and they're going to get that water. Then you need yourself a groundwater district. The water resources of Texas have remained virtually the same since the earliest days of settlement. But we have not. The population of this state has grown exponentially since that time. In fact, our population will likely double to 36 million by 2050. And more people means more competition for water resources. Currently Texans generally use about 180 gallons of water per person per day in order to meet personal, municipal and industrial needs. At that rate, we will need an additional 3.4 billion gallons of water per day to meet the demands of that doubled population. But as demand for water increases, our fresh water supplies do not. Conservation is certainly an important part of the equation. But better irrigation, water reuse and more efficient home appliances can only do so much. So while we search for new ways to meet future demands, we must also find new ways to manage the resources we already have. In the state of Texas, there are two main sources of fresh water, surface water consisting of rivers and streams, and groundwater drawn from aquifers across the state. And while these resources have served us well to this point, we must ensure that they can do so in the future. Of course it falls on our shoulders to properly manage these resources through the governmental process, to assure not only equitable access for all today, but to preserve the resource for future generations. The state owns surface waters, holding them in trust for the citizens. Their use is appropriated through a state-administered permitting system. However, through the legislative process, the people of Texas have time and again said that rules governing the use of groundwater are best created at the local level by local people with local interests, and we do that through groundwater conservation districts. The first groundwater conservation districts were authorized in 1949. Since then, many areas of our state have found increased need to actively manage their underground water resources with many opting to create groundwater conservation districts. Today some 52 operate within the state of Texas, and at the end of the 2001 legislative session, 35 more were authorized. The first groundwater conservation districts were created in the western half of the state where groundwater has long been heavily relied upon. In the years since, we've seen a steady march eastward with new districts created in the central portions of the state, and today districts are being created mainly in the eastern sections of Texas as these areas begin to realize the potential of their groundwater resources. First districts are managed by an elected board, though some recently created districts have appointed board members. In general, the size of the board ranges from five to eleven members, serving four-year staggered terms. These boards meet at least once per quarter. They are the neighbors and friends you select to look after your groundwater interests. These are local people chosen to make local decisions. As government organizations, groundwater conservation districts are accountable to the public. Accounts are funded by you, often through property taxes. Therefore, they must make you aware of what they are doing with your money. Because of this, they are subject to the Open Meetings and Records Acts of the state of Texas. They operate on a fiscal year budget and are subject to annual audits on accounts, receipts, and contracts. The basic job of a groundwater conservation district was laid out in the original 1949 legislation. They must create and implement a comprehensive management plan for that district. They are in charge of permitting large wells, and the district must keep records of all well activity within its borders. From the time the district is confirmed by election, it has two years to evaluate resources and complete the management plan. The plan works for efficient use of groundwater and against both water waste and land subsidence. It will include specific details about the acts, procedures, and measures needed to execute the plan. And recognizing the evolving nature of our communities, the plan is not static. It may be amended at any necessary point and must be re-evaluated and re-adopted every five years. This planning process defines goals for the management of groundwater resources. These goals can vary from district to district. In some areas, the goals will be maintaining the aquifer as a sustainable resource. Others will allow all-pumpage to deplete a percentage of the reservoir capacity. And there are thousands of other management goals covering everything from water levels to quality control. The process culminates in the creation of rules designed to achieve these goals. These rules cover the conservation, preservation, protection, prevention of water waste, control of land subsidence, and recharge of the resource. Districts are required to establish water well permitting and registration programs. Through these efforts, the district is better able to quantify the impacts on the aquifer from pumpage. An efficient water well inventory, permitting, and registration program allows for overall understanding of groundwater use and production within the district. Districts require well drillers to provide records on drilling, equipping, and completion of water wells. Wells producing more than 25,000 gallons of water per day may be required to have a permit. These wells are subject to the district's rules on well spacing, drilling, equipment, and alteration. Often there are exceptions from the permitting process for wells incapable of pumping 25,000 gallons per day. Wells may also exist for those wells supplying domestic needs, providing water for livestock, and certain wells permitted by the Railroad Commission of Texas. But all wells are subject to district rules governing their construction, preventing unnecessary groundwater discharge and aquifer pollution. These basic duties are standard for all groundwater conservation districts. Beyond these, the initial legislation may grant a district the authority to perform other specific duties. And the Board of Directors, with input from the local population, must decide which programs best suit their aquifer management goals. We periodically take, say, 40 or 50 water level and water quality samples to get a snapshot, a point in time of the condition north, south, east, and west within our jurisdiction. What's the most important of these options is the ability to monitor the groundwater resource. The information gathered in these efforts impacts every management decision a district makes. Often wells are drilled solely for this monitoring process. However, some districts work with producers to achieve an even greater understanding of demands on the resource. We installed 150 meters on a voluntary basis with ag producers. Ag meter to ag numbers are very hard to come by, and so we approached it, that we bought the meters and install them and we'll read them on a monthly basis. And we've had real good participation from our ag people. Once they get the meters put in place, they figure out that that's some very good information for their management. We're injecting dyes into these recharge features. And we're coming up with some very valuable scientific information. Research is another important activity a district may choose to conduct. Some people used to speculate that it may take as much as 12 months for water to travel the 9 or 10 miles to Barton Springs. From Hungin Creek we have seen dye that we've injected under high flow conditions reach the springs in less than a week. Gaining specific information like this through research better shapes and defines a management plan. Our research activities all center around how to quantify how much water we've got. We're still trying to get our arms around what is the carrying capacity or the sustainable yield of the aquifer. Historically we have received grant research dollars from the water board, from EPA and TNRCC that support our scientific efforts. As vital as research is for groundwater conservation districts it is seldom cheap. For that reason most districts seek outside funding for such projects and similar costs. Much of the equipment when our district was first created we got from a grant from the Texas Water Development Board is called a 75-25 participation. The Texas Water Development Board they'll supply 75% of the cost and the district will supply the 25. But districts may also make grants and loans in certain cases. For instance the Texas High Plains districts have assisted ag producers in replacing wasteful irrigation equipment. Financing of these center pivot systems definitely saves the aquifer lots and lots of groundwater by taking away the high pressure impact sprinklers which evaporate so much water go to the low energy precise application and consequently the water saved by implementing these center pivots is definitely good for the aquifer. A lot of old abandoned wells exist in Lesbian County. Abandoned water wells are an immediate threat to groundwater quality across Texas. If left unsealed these wells provide a direct conduit for contaminants to enter our groundwater supplies. To counter this threat many districts choose to assist producers in sealing these wells providing expertise and sometimes more. We provide to the landowners the material to plug the abandoned wells at being bent night chips and we provide that at no cost. Basically what a groundwater district does is level the playing field for all the particular users. To meet this goal districts set production limits that apply across the board. So we calculated a very conservative average and that seemed to be kind of the level ground that people could live with. Another tool used by many districts is well spacing. This assures that neighboring properties do not compete for the resource. The key to spacing is called a cone of depression. A cone of depression you have a well drilled down and that well is going to start sucking water from the aquifer. A sand aquifer is not like a glass of water. You have to move the particles of water through this sand and into the well bore and consequently when you are pumping the well if you start pumping it in this position today to tomorrow it is going to be out to this. You have dried that sand out that is in that cone of depression so you just dry it out and in our district we feel that we dry it out to about 300 foot. So all wells drilled in Mesa underground water conservation district must be at least 300 feet from the nearest property line. This assures that the water being taken out of the ground belongs to the landowner above. We have had a situation where a person violated the spacing requirement and we did take that to the necessary conclusions and that well was sealed and they are no longer pumping from that well. The rules of the district are implemented in district court. Who would bring a litigation against that person who is in violation. In our particular case of the spacing violation this particular person just was of the impression that he could violate the rule go over into a corner of his farm and put an irrigation well there which consequently three-fourths of the water that he was mining from this well was coming from adjoining landowners. The adjoining landowners they protested they contested the well spacing and consequently we did stop the well from being produced. But despite the importance of this power it is one district seldom have to exercise. The people are going to follow the rules. The rules are going to be fair and equitable to all the people in the district so consequently what's good for the goose is good for the gander. Twenty years ago when I was working in an oil field business if someone would have told me that twenty years from then that water would be more valuable than oil I would have laughed. But that's exactly what water has become. You just have a whole lot of big cities in the state of Texas that are growing at tremendous rates that don't have enough water and they're going to go somewhere and they're going to get that water. That situation has led to the advent of water marketing where cities, businesses and entrepreneurs pay landowners for access to their groundwater supplies and in many areas this new enterprise is being welcomed with open arms. My management plan has identified in excess of sixty thousand acre feet of water available from the Carrizo aquifer above the projected needs of our district so therefore it would be impossible to just set on this treasure trove. We intend to let the landowners market their resource as they wish. The district may set up rules to regulate this transfer and assure that it is done in a responsible manner but the details of the contract and the profits belong to the landowner. Landowners are free to negotiate their own leases with water purveyors, it is their land, their property. Our district is one of the unique districts in Texas we have a used oil collection program. In this program we have a truck that will go out to everyone who generates waste oil and we pick that up so consequently we serve every person in Dawson County who has a combustible engine. This program protects the groundwater resource from possible contamination. Each district provides unique services like this to fit the needs of its public. Water testing labs are the most common of these services. We do water analysis for anybody in the district who wants their water tested. For domestic and household like that we do bacteria testing. We do E. coli, total total coliform, we do all of this. For the irrigated participants we do pH testing, specific conductivity, chlorides and boron for the peanut gas. We provide this service and consequently we do a lot of work for our people. The purpose of the district besides the regulation of groundwater pumpage is education to dispel myths and rumors to make conservation a way of life. Districts continually work to educate the general public, landowners and policy makers to the importance of groundwater protection and perhaps none of this is more important than the work done with the decision makers of tomorrow. We found and have developed here a water conservation educational program we were able to do in excess of 40,000 fifth graders last year and have done about that same number for the last several years. This is by far the largest of any district educational program and one of the most successful in the nation. Kids love it, the teachers love it, the sponsors love it, our board loves it because in the educational program it actually puts a set of water saving devices in the hands that the child gets to take home and install at home and tests prove to us that those saved about 1400 gallons of water a month. Nobody likes taxes or fees but they're a necessary part of funding a district adequately to do the job properly. The enabling legislation will likely allow groundwater conservation districts to either levy ad valorem taxes or collect fees to pay operation costs, maintenance expenses and bonds. Each district is different in this regard. The state has mandated that no operation and maintenance tax rate will exceed 50 cents per $100 assessed value. However it is important to note that to date only two districts have yet taxed at a higher rate than 7 cents per $100 assessed value. Our fees here in the year 2001 are exactly the same as they were in the first year of our operation which was 1976 and that's $12 per million gallons. Every pocket of groundwater in this state is unique. This system allows for the public policies governing use of groundwater resources to be equally unique. It allows for fair access by all landowners. It allows for the management of a resource to change and grow as better understanding of that resource evolves. Groundwater conservation districts are Texas preferred method for local management of local groundwater resources. They are responsible for the conservation, preservation, enhancement and protection of groundwater resources as well as the prevention of groundwater waste and land subsidence. All the while mapping a course for our long term water needs.