Several Sulphur River basin stakeholders say they support the Texas Sunset Advisory Commission's adoption of changes to Sulphur River Basin Authority, which includes a full sweep of the governor-appointed board and seeking outside funding for water studies.
Liz Fazio-Hale, the executive director of Riverbend Water Resources District, said that while their board hasn't adopted an official position on the Sunset decision, she trusts the Commission's recommendations.
"Overall, there is an investment in water that has to be made and is very crucial to this area," she said. "We need to be paying attention to water resources and not just spectators to the game. Water is our future and our livelihood, just like any other economic driver in the area."
Riverbend is comprised of 15 counties and cities and one organization: Bowie, Cass and Red River counties; the cities of Texarkana, Texas and Ark., and several outlying cities and towns; and TexAmericas Center. It governs the area's water infrastructure and resources to represent the interests of those cities and counties and TexAmericas, and to protect the ownership and distribution of water in the region.
SRBA was created in 1985 to conserve and develop natural resources within the river basin, which covers 11 counties. It's come under fire with the Sunset Advisory Committee's staff report released in April, which brought to light the organization's lack of transparency, improper meeting procedures and ineffective leadership. Sunset's process includes investigating and reviewing all state agencies and reporting their findings to the Advisory Committee. Those proposed changes are then reviewed and adopted by the committee and sent to the Texas Legislature for approval.
The committee met Monday and recommended that all the changes in the staff report be implemented, in addition to seeking the advice of local judges "before making a decision on a project for which it would seek permits."
While these recommendations don't become official changes until they're voted on in this spring's legislative session, Fazio-Hale said she cannot emphasize the importance of Sunset's serious review of SRBA's resource management.
"It is an agency entity review commission. They do this full-time and regularly," she said. "Whether legislation is passed or not, the seriousness of those recommendations is something I do think this region needs to take note of."
While SRBA has conducted several studies in the basin, they were funded by the non-local Joint Commission for Program Development. The organization includes the city of Dallas, the city of Irving, North Texas Municipal Water District, Tarrant Regional Water District and the Upper Trinity Water District-all seeking water for their growing populations.
The Sunset report addressed this, as well, and stated that SRBA needed to seek outside funding, and more input from its stakeholders before conducting any further studies. SRBA recently applied for a Clean Water grant from the Texas Water Resources Institute to study sedimentation in Wright Patman Lake, an issue stakeholders have long known needed to be addressed. Little to nothing has been done to address the lake's filling up and taking much-needed water space. Stakeholders say they are willing to work with SRBA to continue studying the problem, but under certain conditions.
During their August meeting, Riverbend made a resolution supporting SRBA's efforts in seeking the basin characterization study. It asks that SRBA publicly support Riverbend and the city of Texarkana, Texas, as water rights holders on any current and future water that may be developed in Wright Patman.
The city has repeatedly asked SRBA for a meeting to get everyone on the same page and passed a resolution last year stating their official distrust of the organization.
Even with all the changes SRBA made to address the Sunset report's findings, including the election of Texarkana's Mike Sandefur as president, a meeting hasn't been held. Steve Mayo, the city's water liaison, said that just a few months of reorganization and transparency doesn't change 30 years of mistrust and years of the organization's not acknowledging its stakeholders.
"We need them to answer our questions," he said. "Why would Texarkana, Texas, and this area spend a lot of money in Patman if someone else is going to get the water rights?"
Mayo said he agrees with Sunset's recommendation for SRBA to seek funding other than JCPD, and that all studies should be conducted with "good science, not wants."
"One of their (SRBA's) main faults is they've never taken care of anything," he said. "They have to earn trust. That is earned, not given. They haven't done that yet. If anyone disagrees with that, they have their head in the sand."
Andrea Williams-McCoy has been involved with the water issue for several years and in many capacities, including working with former state Rep. George Lavender when he represented District 1. Now with Ward Timber, Williams-McCoy said that for 30 years, SRBA has done nothing to protect the basin or its stakeholders.
"Facts are facts, and here they are," she said of the Sunset report. "Texas gave SRBA the authority to take care of the Sulphur River basin. For 30 years, they have done absolutely nothing. I would consider it one of the most colossal failures in state government history."
She added that SRBA's changes were a direct result of changes at the state level, not from within the board itself.
"This has been a long time coming," she said. "It didn't happen because of one person. Many people for many years stayed the course and were diligent in expressing concerns of this state entity. I appreciate the diligence of the Sunset staff to really dig down and separate fact from fiction and rhetoric from reality and get to the heart of the matter, because that often gets lost in the emotionality of the issue."
Fazio-Hale said Riverbend is actively working with stakeholders to form a regional plan to put infrastructure in place for current and future water needs. She said they are fine with partnering with SRBA on projects, but that they must remain participants in those and not sit on the sidelines.
"The best message is that local entities cannot be spectators," she said. "We need to be playing in the game."