What the Texas Water Development Board Means to You

Background

The Texas State Legislature created the Texas Water Development Board in 1957 (by act and by amendment to the state constitution) to manage the state’s water resources in the urgency following the drought of the 1950s. The board has found a new urgency after the drought of 2011. Water supplies are only slowly recovering (if at all), but demand for water is growing.

The board is charged with, “leadership, planning, financial assistance, information, and education for the conservation and responsible development of water for Texas,” according to its mission statement. It’s made up of six members appointed by the governor and meets every third Wednesday of the month in Austin. Their mission includes issuing State Water Plans; the last of nine over the course of its existence was submitted to the governor in January 2012.

The plan includes suggested changes to water management. Debate over the plan will further play out in the 2013 legislative session.

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April 15, 2013

Report Shows Texas Counties Where Fracking and Water Needs Collide

The Texas legislature is currently considering plans to fund water projects for the state. Meanwhile, the oil and gas industry is using billions of gallons of freshwater for fracking, which is getting the attention of lawmakers. Virginia Palacios, a research associate at the Environmental Defense Fund, has a new analysis showing that many of the Texas counties […]

April 11, 2013

Hurricanes May Be Needed to Help Pull Texas Out of Drought

http://youtu.be/OWBX3QesGnQ Some parts of the state may find themselves in the strange position of actually needing hurricanes this summer. Victor Murphy, climate program manager at National Weather Service Southern Region, says tropical storm landfall could be the best hope to get rain to parts of Texas that desperately need it. Even though much of the state experienced […]

New Plan Would Put Water and Roads Funding in Voters’ Hands

Water and roads are hot topics at the Texas legislature this session, as for the first time in several sessions, lawmakers make real efforts to fund new water and road projects for the growing state. While there seems to be a broad consensus that significant new funding is needed; as expected, it’s in the particulars […]

March 27, 2013

Texas House Passes Major Water Bill

The Texas House approved legislation today that would use $2 billion to fund more water projects in the state. HB 4, by Rep. Allan Ritter, R-Nederland, would create a water bank that would offer loans for projects like new water reservoirs, pipelines and conservation projects. “As Mother Nature has reminded us in the last couple […]

March 14, 2013

Major Water Funding Bill Moves One Step Forward, Prioritizes Conservation

Significant new funding for water projects in a dry, thirsty Texas moved one step closer to becoming a reality today. The bill, HB 4, would take money from the state’s Rainy Day Fund to start a loan program for new water projects. It passed unanimously in a committee, and now it heads to the House floor for […]

March 8, 2013

List of Texas Water Projects Draws Concerns Over Conservation

Within days of the announcement earlier this year that the state legislature could get serious about funding new water projects in Texas, folks started having questions. Where will that money go? Why not make more of the water we have instead of building more reservoirs? And what’s to prevent the proposed $2 billion ‘water bank’ […]

In Texas, Water Use for Fracking Stirs Concerns

From the Texas Tribune: CARRIZO SPRINGS — In this South Texas stretch of mesquite trees and cactus, where the land is sometimes too dry to grow crops, the local aquifer is being strained in the search for oil. The reason is hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, a drilling process that requires massive amounts of water. “We […]

March 4, 2013

Legislation Would Require Water Well Owners to Report Usage

A Texas lawmaker has introduced a bill that would help the state keep better track of how much water it’s using. State Senator Kel Seliger, R-Amarillo, has filed a bill, SB 272, requiring most farmers to report their water usage to the Texas Water Development Board. “It’s important to have an empirical measure of groundwater […]

February 19, 2013

Texas Mayors Stress Need For More Water Conservation and Less Red Tape

“Whiskey is for drinking and water is for fighting,” said John Cook, Mayor of El Paso, echoing Mark Twain at the House Natural Resources Committee meeting that began early this morning. Mark Twain may have changed his tune, though, if he saw the Capitol meeting room tightly packed with mayors from Texas’ largest cities, lawmakers […]

February 14, 2013

Texas Lawmaker Seeks Overhaul of Water Board

From the Texas Tribune: In addition to the intensifying discussions of water infrastructure funding at the Capitol, an even more basic conversation is also getting under way: whether to restructure the Texas Water Development Board. The board, created in 1957, is overseen by six part-time board members, who serve on a volunteer basis after being […]