Where Did Spicewood Beach’s Water Go?

[white cloud]

Mose Buchele of StateImpact Texas and Andy Uhler of KUT News contributed to this report.

Just weeks before water had to be trucked in to Spicewood Beach, it was being sold to haulers who trucked it out. Over a million gallons in the last year.

Today, StateImpact Texas spoke with Larry Ogden of Hamilton Pool H20, one of two haulers that bought water from the Lower Colorado River Authority (LCRA) in Spicewood Beach. The community doesn’t actually own their own water — they gave it over to the LCRA over a decade ago. The LCRA now owns and manages the wells, which began to fail Monday.
http://stateimpact.npr.org/texas/2012/02/02/where-did-spicewood-beachs-water-go/

[benld74]

1. Did they KNOW they gave it to LCRA?

[TexasTowelie]

2. The Legislature needs to amend the laws concerning water rights.

Another example of a private entity exploiting public resources to generate excess profits. Hopefully, the recent rains will alleviate the situation in Spicewood Beach.

About 15 years ago, I recall that a catfish farm was using about 25% of the water from the San Antonio river which impacted San Antonio and the communities downstream.

With the increase in "fracking" for the oil business throughout Texas, it is in the public interest for water rates to reflect the true value of the resource and subsidies should be eliminated for commercial entities.

[BlueToTheBone]

3. They probably thought that it would be too

costly to maintain their own system...oops.