By Russ Pankonin
    The Imperial Republican
     At a time when the state's Department of Natural Resources has proposed significant lower irrigation allocations in the future, board members in the Lower Republican Natural Resource District fired off a shot of their own last week.
     They forwarded a proposal to set a district-wide allocation in the LRNRD of 11 inches per acre for a five-year period. The allocation must face a public hearing before becoming part of the district's rules and regulations.
     The previous allocation had given farmers east of U. S. Highway 183 11 inches an acre and 12 inches an acre west of the highway.
     The 11-inch allocation varies greatly from the 3.5 inches DNR proposed in dry years or even the 6.5 inches in years with normal rainfall.
     Mike Clements, manager of the LRNRD, said his board felt they need to make a statement to DNR with the higher allocation, firing a shot across DNR's bow, so to speak, to get their attention.
     "We're not going to accept the fact of a 3.5- or 6.5-inch allocation," he said.
     He said his board has become frustrated with the whole process with DNR in developing allocations.
     As a result, he said the board decided to take a stand on the allocations they wanted to set things in motion.
     While the district can still approve a higher allocation in their rules and regs, DNR must sign off on an integrated management plan that includes the allocations.
     Under the provisions of LB 962 passed several years ago after being supported by the Water Task Force, DNR must still approve the allocations set by the district.
     If the two don't agree, then the issue goes before the Interrelated Water Review Board created in LB 962 to settle disputes.
     "We're fully prepared to do this," the manager said this week.
     He said they are disappointed by the lower allocations after all the NRDs in the basin joined together to get LB 701 passed to address compliance issues and add to the water supply through surface water buyouts.
     These lower allocations fail to address compliance with Kansas until 2012, he noted.
     Producers need to know where their allocation is going to be so they can make plans.
     He said the economy of the basin is already fragile and the allocations proposed by DNR would harm producers even more.
    Ethanol plants watching
     Clements said they have three potential ethanol plants that are looking at their region.
     Their fear is not the water for the plants but whether producers will have an ample allocation to produce the corn they need.
     He fears a lower allocation to producers will make ethanol developers reluctant to relocate in their district.
     He said the board believes they are doing what's best for the producers in their district.
     He doesn't want the basin to become servants to DNR, since they are already the ones paying for compliance efforts, implementing the efforts and regulating them.
    URNRD allocation
     Jasper Fanning, manager of the Upper Republican NRD, said his board hopes to advance a recommendation on allocations at its August meeting.
     He said a basin-wide planning meeting was scheduled for Wednesday, July 18, with DNR Director Ann Bleed.
     He said the URNRD has called a special board meeting Friday, July 27, to meet with Bleed on allocations for the district.
     Under DNR's proposal, the URNRD would only receive a drought allocation of 5.5 inches and only 8.5 inches in an average year.
     Like Clements, Fanning, too, was concerned with how the allocation negotiating process had been going with DNR.
    For The Record
     In last week's story on the possible fees needed to cover the URNRD's share of cost for the water buyout, there was some ambiguity with the per-acre costs.
     The headline read that $6.50 per-irrigated acre fee would be needed while the story said $6.25.
     That should have been represented as a possible range from $6.25 to $6.50. Fanning said the range could still increase slightly depending on how the handling of delinquent payments are accounted for.