Proposed reductions in irrigation to provide water for recreational wildlife could be catastrophic to our local communities.

"It is simply taking water from one use, and giving it to another in an area that has sufficient water levels."
The amount of revenue that irrigated cropland in the affected area brings into the local economy is approximately $190 million per year, and under proposals being considered to require reductions in irrigation, this could be reduced by $20 to $50 million per year for perpetuity, with the full effect ranging from $30-$125 million per year or more.
​In reducing irrigation, there would be a ripple effect in the revenue of businesses that employ people and provide services in agronomy, grain merchandising and storage, fuel, fertilizer, agriculture equipment, as well as in non-agriculture related retail, housing, and health care.    
School enrollment in districts, already small and operating in innovative ways to maintain high quality education on small budgets, would drop and possibly threaten the ability to keep the doors open.  Land prices would fall, negatively impacting the tax base on which local governments and schools depend.  It would cripple agricultural banking that has collateralized loans based on current land valuations, which  would not only threaten existing loans but would freeze future lending.  
"This issue will impact EVERYONE in rural communities, not just farmers."

What's the issue?

​The issue arose from a claim that the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service (The Service), which operates Quivira National Wildlife Refuge (The Refuge), made that water flowing into The Refuge from the Rattlesnake Creek has been negatively impacted by irrigation. By Kansas law, The Service's water right is senior to the groundwater rights of most irrigators. Therefore, more surface water must be provided to The Refuge. It is important to note this is not a water conservation measure for a declining water table; the groundwater table in this area is stable and the issue at hand is to provide additional surface water to The Refuge. The issue now being deliberated is how much water must be provided, and how that will be accomplished. The Chief Engineer at the Kansas Department of Agriculture Division of Water Resources has determined that augmentation, which would involve drilling new wells, is an acceptable method for providing the additional water that the Refuge is entitled to under his ruling. The question is how that augmentation will occur, where the wells will be drilled, where the water will be delivered, and if additional reductions in irrigation will also be required.

The Simple & Efficient Solution

Drilling wells directly on the Refuge could accomplish the goal of supplementing surface water for recreation without reducing water allocated to agriculture. This would be much more efficient than taking water from wells many miles away, developing expensive piping to move it to the Refuge, or pumping millions of gallons of well water to the Rattlesnake where evaporation and seepage will occur. This is the most efficient use of limited water resources and therefore an environmentally responsible solution. However, it takes the cooperation of the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service to allow drilling water wells on The Refuge which is itself a man-made wildlife habitat first developed in the 1950's. 

Big Bend Groundwater Management District 5 Website