Las Vegas Sun

March 28, 2024

State wants Nevada Supreme Court to reconsider water rights ruling

CARSON CITY — The state is going to ask the Nevada Supreme Court to reconsider a decision that could impact thousands of water rights in rural counties.

Allen Biaggi, director of the state Department of Conservation and Natural Resources, said the decision of the court could affect water rights back to 1947.

The Southern Nevada Water Authority also intends to ask the Supreme Court to take another look at the ruling, which could significantly delay plans to pipe water from rural Nevada to Las Vegas.

At issue is a Supreme Court ruling that state engineer Tracy Taylor violated the law in 2007 when he approved rights for the water authority to withdraw 40,000 acre feet of water year from Spring Valley in Eastern Nevada.

The Las Vegas Valley Water Department, predecessor to the water authority, filed applications in 1989 to withdraw nearly 800,000 acre feet of water a year from parts of rural Nevada.

In response to the Supreme Court ruling, the water authority resubmitted all of the 1989 applications for water in parts of rural Nevada.

The court’s ruling was hailed as a victory by environmental groups and residents of rural Nevada who fear the water authority is trying to divert too much water to the south.

Abby Johnson of the Great Basin Water Network said it would oppose the reconsideration.

“We are going to be in this process all the way,” she said. “It would be great to get this back to the district judge and for him to take another look and get a ruling.”

The water network, the Defenders of Wildlife and rural landowners argued before the Supreme Court that they were unfairly excluded from being able to protest the original groundwater applications.

The Supreme Court ordered District Judge Norman Robison in Ely to determine whether the authority must file new applications or if the state engineer’s office must only reopen the protest period and the hearings.

Cy Ryan may be reached at (775) 687 5032 or [email protected].

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