DETRATCTORS BLAST WATER DISTRICT

Critics of the Cow Creek Groundwater Conservation District are questioning its elected board's decision to fine a regional water broker in combination with a related action that threatens to put a local car washing operation out of business.

The decision has even led CCGCD critics and local business supporters to question the board's motives and the need for its existence.

“It has become very clear that they have been a power-hungry agency that is not accountable to anyone,” said Kendall County property owner Mike Luckey.

“It's an agency that bears watching,” said Bob Imler, a community and government relations consultant in charge of lobbying efforts for the Greater Boerne Chamber of Commerce's Government Affairs Council, who emphasized he was speaking as a private citizen and not for the chamber.

“We have planning and zoning and plenty of other safeguards in place in the state of Texas to protect the public good and I have some real reservations about how much we need these local districts and about agency redundancy,” Imler continued.

“I get concerned when I see over-zealous efforts by an agency to expand its authority.

It troubles me as a private citizen, as a private property rights advocate, as a taxpayer. When we start getting regulatory agencies that are just running roughshod over the business interests of this state, then I've got a problem with it.”

The latest controversy stems from the CCGCD board's vote to assess Aqua Texas a total of $5,700 in fines and legal fees for failure to secure required permits, to notify customers of drought restrictions and to reduce water usage by 40 percent at the Walnut Hills subdivision northwest of Boerne.

The board also rejected pleas from Aqua Texas at the same Dec. 8 enforcement hearing that it be allowed to continue selling 100,000 gallons of groundwater a month to Frontline Mobile Wash, a company operated by Ray Shannon out of his home at Walnut Hills.

Shannon treats water provided by Aqua Texas from ground sources at Walnut Hills and uses it to clean vehicles at auto dealerships in four Hill Country counties.

Several attempts to contact Shannon for this report were unsuccessful, but in a letter to the View, Luckey claimed the board's action will run Shannon “out of business and take away from his ability to provide for his family.”

The CCGCD office was closed for the holidays, and a message left on the home phone of board president Thomas Mathews was not returned by press time.

In denying a request from Aqua Texas to continue selling Shannon water, the CCGCD board suggested Shannon seek alternative water sources, including Canyon Lake surface water from the Guadalupe-Blanco River Authority pipeline. It is unclear, though, whether that water is actually available, and Shannon has said in the past that he had no alternative to water purchased from Aqua Texas.

Aqua Texas also argued that the 40 percent reduction in water usage at Walnut Hills under current Stage 5 drought restrictions was unrealistic, because of the relatively low usage already being recorded. The company has said it is contemplating legal action in the wake of the board's decision and indicated it will continue providing water to Shannon.

With the exception of Shannon's operation, the average resident at Walnut Hills only uses about 6,500 gallons of water a month, a figure that is well below the average of many other Kendall County developments. The average SAWS customer in neighboring Bexar County, which relies on the Edwards Aquifer, used about 8,600 gallons of water a month over the past 12 months.

Other Kendall County developments have been able to meet the 40 percent reduction by limiting landscape watering, but Walnut Hills comprises mostly manufactured homes with minimal irrigation needs.

Luckey also questioned well water level estimates used by the CCGCD, claiming that the lack of individual well meters makes any overall estimate unreliable and subject to manipulation.

“The larger drops that are normally published in the paper are located near large city wells,” Luckey said in his letter, citing water levels in many developments, including Cordillera and Waterstone, that have fallen only five to 15 feet with anywhere from 140 to 189 feet of water still remaining.

When contacted by the View, Luckey noted that Aqua Texas has had no trouble working with water authorities in Kerr County or in other areas of the state.

“They get along great with them,” Luckey said.

Imler called the CCGCD's board's actions against Aqua Texas and Frontline Mobile Wash “arbitrary and capricious” and said they were taken “without a factual basis.”

“I'm troubled by what seems to be a cavalier attitude on the part of certain board members,” Imler said.

Imler said the CCGCD board errs in assuming local residents and businesses are not already acting responsibly to limit water usage and to avoid waste, even as it insists on enforcing what he sees as unrealistic and needless restrictions based on flawed data.

“I just don't see people squandering water,” Imler said. “It's too precious a resource and everybody acknowledges that. We need a lot more scientific data before you start putting people out of business and capping their wells. There's got to be defensible logic and scientific data to back up these kinds of draconian decisions and my concern is it's just not there. As a business person, that's what really irks me.”

This is not the first time a decision by the CCGCD has stirred controversy. Last August, the board denied a request by Tapatio Springs for a variance that would have allowed groundwater to be used for golf course irrigation, a denial course managers said would have permanently damaged greens and harmed residential property values.

The board partially reversed course soon after and granted a temporary operating permit for a well to be used for irrigation.

The CCGCD was created in 2002 and has attracted little interest from either the public or potential candidates since its inception. The latter is likely to change in the next election cycle, given the recent spate of controversies.

“Trust me, that will not happen again,” Imler said.

“The next time there are open seats up for election, the public will know about it.”

-Michael Reeder, Hill Country View