Sunday, March 7, 1999
Area towns differ in response to crisis
By JERRY DANIEL REED
Senior Staff Writer
Repeated generous rainfalls for the next several months would
cover a multitude of problems for Big Country residents.
In many places, water would flow from the tap cheaper, tastier
and more abundantly, though less would be needed.
Water could become cheaper in towns such as Big Spring and
Snyder, where the filling of closer lakes would eliminate the
need for costly pumping water from more distant reservoirs.
Water would become tastier in towns such as Snyder and Stamford,
which now have to draw water from the bottom few feet of lakes
that are much muddier or saltier than water from a full lake.
And by definition water would become more plentiful with abundant
rains. Less tap water would be used to water grass, trees, shrubs
and vegetable plants.
 But because this simple
obvious solution can’t be counted on at any given time, Big
County residents must keep looking for other ways to assure they
won’t go thirsty.
Ironically, one of the area’s greatest symbols of its
people’s enduring foresight in providing for their future
water needs also stands as a stark representative of today’s
acute water problems: Lake L.B. Thomas southwest of Snyder.
Thomas was the original reservoir the Colorado River Municipal
Water District was created to build, but now most of its muddy
bottom sits bare with the lake down to a mere with 3 percent of
its capacity.
Snyder, which with Big Spring and Odessa formed the water district
a half century ago, doesn’t go without water because the
district has always managed to stay ahead of the curve in anticipating
its members’ and customers’ needs. A couple of times
this required pitched battles with the Lower Colorado River Authority,
owner of water rights in the river from San Saba County south
of Brownwood to the Gulf Coast.
The LCRA objected first to the construction of Spence Reservoir
west of Robert Lee, then O.H. Ivie Reservoir in the corners of
Coleman, Runnels and Concho counties. The CRMWD eventually won
both battles, and in recent years the two river water agencies
have begun to value the virtue of cooperation over conflict.
Though Big Spring and Snyder both are assured they won’t
go without water any time soon, it doesn’t mean they lack
for water problems.
For openers, look at costs.
The price of water from the water district to each of its members
and customers varies with the cost of providing that water, with
electricity for pumping a major part of that expense.
Ivie water must be pumped 180 miles west, uphill, to a gathering
station near the Midland airport en route to its member and customer
cities.
The price each city pays the water district is passed on to
its residential and commercial customers on their monthly water
bills.
For Snyder, the added expense is compounded by a deterioration
in taste. Though most of the water Snyder residents now consume
comes from high-quality Ivie, it must first be pumped into the
nearly empty Thomas for re-pumping into water lines for distribution
to household and business customers. Treatment doesn’t quite
get all the lake-bottom mud out, said Snyder water superintendent
Darrell Cal-lahan.
Big Spring residents, however, have enjoyed an opposite reversal
of taste fortunes. They now enjoy water pumped from Ivie without
the intermediary of another lake, and find it more savory than
the higher mineral content liquid they’d become used to from
Spence.
Area towns’ water situations include:
Sweetwater
Sweetwater last week became the first area city this year to
enter the first of four stages in a progressively more stringent
water conservation and drought contingency plan. The move was
triggered when Oak Creek Reservoir, the city’s main water
supply source among its three lakes, dipped below the pre-determined
threshold of 10 feet below spillway.
The north Coke County lake’s official reading Tuesday
was 10 feet, 2 inches below spillway, said City Manager David
Maddox.
The first stage imposes no mandatory measures, but calls on
Sweetwater citizens to voluntarily curtail nonessential use of
water. Step 2, to be triggered when Oak Creek drops more than
15 feet below spillway, would mandate specific and enforceable
water use restrictions.
Brownwood
Brownwood and all its smaller Brown County sister cities are
sitting pretty with their water supply, Lake Brownwood, 83 percent
full and modern infrastructure in good repair and paid for, said
Sam Oswood, deputy general manager of the Brown County Water Improve-ment
District No. 1. The district, which operates the lake, substantially
rebuilt its infrastructure from 1982-88 to obtain its present
enviable position, he said.
Oswood said the lake’s current water supply should last
its members a couple of years.
The watersheds of Pecan Bayou, which flows out of the Clyde
Lake, and Jim Ned Creek, which rises in west Coleman County, fill
Lake Brownwood.
Stephenville
Stephenville differs from other major Big Country cities in
relying on groundwater rather than lake surface water for most
of its water supply. But city officials have been looking around
for a supplemental supply for fear their three well fields in
the huge Trinity Aquifer will continue to decline.
Of three options studied by a consulting firm, Lake Proctor
in neighboring Comanche County was seen to be the most economical,
said Danny Johnson, director of utilities. The city is seeking
to buy the rights to 274 acre feet of Proctor, to be transported
over a 10-mile pipeline.
One estimate of the cost is $6 million, which city officials
would hope to finance with a state loan.
Snyder and
Big Spring
Though the people of these two western Big Country towns don’t
have to worry where their next drink is coming from, they have
other concerns: the high costs of pumping water from Ivie and
the aging in-town delivery infrastructures of both systems.
Both Snyder and Big Spring have programs to systematically
replace their water lines, they could stand to pick up the pace
of replacement if the cost weren’t so massive.
Stamford and Hamlin
Stamford and Hamlin have been casting around for supplemental
water to back up Lake Stamford, which sat about 18 percent full
last week.
In the past, they’ve talked to Abilene officials about
buying treated water without reaching a deal.
The two Jones County towns have been assured they qualify for
funding from the Texas Water Development Board, and could also
obtain federal Rural Development funds, to augment their water
supplies. But the price tag of the project, and thus their funding
need, also remains indefinite.
“There’s been every number presented from $4.5 million
to $11.8 million,’’ said Stamford City Manager Ken Roberson.
“That’s a massive project for two little towns.’’
Though water development loan interest is set very low, commonly
in the 2 percent range, and long-term pay-outs are provided, “That’s
still a lot of money,’’ Roberson said.
In the meantime, the cities face quality as well as quantity
problems. It’s a common problem with lakes: the lower the
lake level sinks, the higher the salt concentration, because dissolved
salts don’t evaporate along with the surface water.
“It’s just becoming saltier and saltier,’’
he lamented.
Without rain, Roberson said, his city’s water conservation
plan Stage 1 — asking and educating citizens to voluntarily
cut back on water consumption — would arrive by May or early
June — earlier if spring turns out to be a scorcher.
Haskell and Knox counties
Voters in Haskell and Knox counties decided in January to protect
their underground water resources from unlimited outside exploitation
by approving an underground water conservation district.
Not that there’s been a problem, said Knox County Judge
David Perdue, but in the quest to nail down water rights, the
two counties chose to protect their future.
Mitchell County
Mitchell County commissioners last December took steps to create
a water conservation district mainly concerned with the Santa
Rosa Aquifer.
If the Legislature approves, county voters could choose as
early as August to activate a district with the power to build
dams, drain lakes and install pumps to recharge underground water,
as well as the authority to levy taxes to finance any of these.
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Copyright ©1999,
Abilene Reporter-News / Texnews / E.W. Scripps Publications
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