By Russ Pankonin
    The Imperial Republican
     Irrigators in the Upper Republican Natural Resource District will get to offer input on the proposed rules and regulations (R&R) for the district.
     The URNRD will hold a hearing on the proposals in Imperial tonight (Thursday, Jan. 24) beginning at 6 p.m. at the Lied Imperial Library on the corner of 7th and Broadway.
     Perhaps the biggest issue in the proposed R&R involves the allocation.
     The proposal calls for a 13-inch irrigation allocation for a period of five years.
     The proposed rules do not include any mandatory acreage reduction by irrigators. An earlier proposal included a 5 percent reduction in irrigated acres while leaving the allocation at its present level of 13.5 inches.
     URNRD Manager Jasper Fanning said the board and the office got lots of feedback against the acreage reduction.
     Fanning said several farmers noted they would do their own acreage reduction if needed as part of their own allocation management. What they didn't want was a mandated reduction by the NRD.
     However, Kansas has stated in a December, 2007 letter to Ann Bleed, director of the Nebraska Department of Natural Resources, that they want a reduction in water use in the basin.
     In the letter, they stated they want all irrigation wells in Nebraska within 2.5 miles of either side of the Republican River and all of its tributaries shut down.
     Furthermore, they want all wells drilled in the basin after 2000 to also be shut down.
     In a December interview, Kansas water official, David Barfield, said Kansas is growing impatient with Nebraska on providing Kansas with its fair share of water.
     In another recent interview, he took a hard line position, saying they are ready to pursue the issue by starting formal arbitration on the issue. If unsettled, the issue could go back before the U.S. Supreme Court.
    Carryforward remains in R&R
     The R&R proposal also leaves carryforward (CF) in place as a management tool for dry periods.
     The CF provides farmers with a water management tool during dry years, NRD Manager Fanning noted.
     He said the groundwater committee discussed at length how to limit the use of CF in years of average precipitation when CF shouldn't be needed.
     No changes were made but Fanning said it will be something the NRD will track closely in the future.
     The proposed R&R already allow for water banking through the transfer rules that already exist.
     The concept of water banking calls for buying water from quick response areas, in turn reducing consumptive use and aiding compact compliance.
     This purchased water could then be used in areas where additional pumping would have little or no immediate impact on stream flows.