Needed: A process, a deadline, a panel | ajc.com
Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Needed: A process, a deadline, a panel
Published on: 11/15/07
In his oft-quoted "Serenity Prayer," theologian Reinhold Niebuhr asks God for "the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference."
Those are good words to live by, in public life as well as private. We have to accept, for example, that we cannot end this drought by making it rain. That is beyond our powers, pray as we might. We can dam rivers and split the atom and put a man on the moon, but making rain fall when and where we wish eludes us.
However, we do have the power — if not yet the courage — to share the water we have more wisely. For 17 years, we've been fighting our downstream neighbors in Alabama and Florida for control of the Chattahoochee River system, and we have nothing to show except hard feelings and big attorney fees. It's time that ended. It's time we all grew up a little bit and got this thing settled.
At the moment, one lawsuit is awaiting action by the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Washington. Another handful of federal cases have been consolidated down in Florida into a single case before a special federal judge brought in from Minnesota. Still other cases, such as Alabama's recent suit to stop a new reservoir in Cherokee County, pop up all the time.
Seeking resolution of this problem through the courts, in other words, is a fool's errand. And unfortunately, out-of-court negotiation and mediation don't offer much hope of success either. In fact, while Gov. Sonny Perdue has succeeded in winning short-term changes in the operation of Lake Lanier, his high-profile tactics have stirred new anger and resentment among our downstream neighbors.
So how do we break the deadlock? Well, if the three states can't agree on a resolution, maybe they can agree to submit to a process and a deadline. We should assemble a panel of outside experts, give them a year and a sufficient budget, and then make their final recommendations binding on all three states and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. You take out the politics and the posturing, and you get a decision based on the facts of the case.
Such a process would undoubtedly require congressional action, but the alternative is to keep fighting this in the courts forever, which serves nobody.
However, the process can't end there, because the issues won't end there. Alabama, Georgia and Florida should also agree to a tristate commission to manage the Apalachicola-Chattahoochee-Flint watershed, following the model of states facing similar challenges.
For example New York, Delaware, Pennsylvania and New Jersey share the Delaware River watershed. Through the congressionally created Delaware River Basin Commission, they have also shared responsibility for its management.
The issues addressed by the DRBC, and the competing demands it has balanced for more than 40 years, should sound very familiar to those of us in the Southeast.
A major metropolitan area — New York City — draws half its water from the upper reaches of the Delaware watershed, just as metro Atlanta draws most of its water from the upper Chattahoochee. Downstream power plants and other industries rely heavily on the Delaware, which also hosts an economically important recreational fishing industry. The Delaware even hosts an endangered mussel, in this case the dwarf wedgemussel.
The commission has managed the Delaware watershed through major droughts and brought the states together to improve the river's environmental health. In 2004, for example, a Pennsylvania utility agreed to regular releases of water from its private reservoir to improve downstream trout fishing. "Only interstate collaboration through the DRBC could bring a Pennsylvania power company to the aid of a New York fisheries program," according to Carol Collier, the commission's executive director.
Because, as Niebuhr also noted, "Democracy is finding proximate solutions to insoluble problems."
Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Needed: A process, a deadline, a panel
Published on: 11/15/07
In his oft-quoted "Serenity Prayer," theologian Reinhold Niebuhr asks God for "the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference."
Those are good words to live by, in public life as well as private. We have to accept, for example, that we cannot end this drought by making it rain. That is beyond our powers, pray as we might. We can dam rivers and split the atom and put a man on the moon, but making rain fall when and where we wish eludes us.
However, we do have the power — if not yet the courage — to share the water we have more wisely. For 17 years, we've been fighting our downstream neighbors in Alabama and Florida for control of the Chattahoochee River system, and we have nothing to show except hard feelings and big attorney fees. It's time that ended. It's time we all grew up a little bit and got this thing settled.
At the moment, one lawsuit is awaiting action by the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Washington. Another handful of federal cases have been consolidated down in Florida into a single case before a special federal judge brought in from Minnesota. Still other cases, such as Alabama's recent suit to stop a new reservoir in Cherokee County, pop up all the time.
Seeking resolution of this problem through the courts, in other words, is a fool's errand. And unfortunately, out-of-court negotiation and mediation don't offer much hope of success either. In fact, while Gov. Sonny Perdue has succeeded in winning short-term changes in the operation of Lake Lanier, his high-profile tactics have stirred new anger and resentment among our downstream neighbors.
So how do we break the deadlock? Well, if the three states can't agree on a resolution, maybe they can agree to submit to a process and a deadline. We should assemble a panel of outside experts, give them a year and a sufficient budget, and then make their final recommendations binding on all three states and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. You take out the politics and the posturing, and you get a decision based on the facts of the case.
Such a process would undoubtedly require congressional action, but the alternative is to keep fighting this in the courts forever, which serves nobody.
However, the process can't end there, because the issues won't end there. Alabama, Georgia and Florida should also agree to a tristate commission to manage the Apalachicola-Chattahoochee-Flint watershed, following the model of states facing similar challenges.
For example New York, Delaware, Pennsylvania and New Jersey share the Delaware River watershed. Through the congressionally created Delaware River Basin Commission, they have also shared responsibility for its management.
The issues addressed by the DRBC, and the competing demands it has balanced for more than 40 years, should sound very familiar to those of us in the Southeast.
A major metropolitan area — New York City — draws half its water from the upper reaches of the Delaware watershed, just as metro Atlanta draws most of its water from the upper Chattahoochee. Downstream power plants and other industries rely heavily on the Delaware, which also hosts an economically important recreational fishing industry. The Delaware even hosts an endangered mussel, in this case the dwarf wedgemussel.
The commission has managed the Delaware watershed through major droughts and brought the states together to improve the river's environmental health. In 2004, for example, a Pennsylvania utility agreed to regular releases of water from its private reservoir to improve downstream trout fishing. "Only interstate collaboration through the DRBC could bring a Pennsylvania power company to the aid of a New York fisheries program," according to Carol Collier, the commission's executive director.
Because, as Niebuhr also noted, "Democracy is finding proximate solutions to insoluble problems."
