Collins Speaks Out on Corps Irrigation Ban

Property owners living along the shores of Lake Hartwell may be a little more hopeful today after hearing from U.S. Congressman Doug Collins Monday night on the Corps of Engineers’ plan to ban permits allowing them to use lake water to irrigate their lawns and gardens.

Hundreds packed the Adult Learning Center of the Hart County Library Monday night for the meeting of the Hart County Property Owners Association to hear from Collins as well as representatives from U.S. Senator Johnny Isakson’s office and U.S. Senator David Perdue’s office.

Association member Mike Buckle said the water in Hartwell Hartwell belongs to the people, not the Corps and he says shoreline property owners have a contract that the Corps is breaking.

“Like the cities, counties and water districts we have a contract with the Corps and we pay for that in our permits to buy water and irrigate our lawns,” Buckle said. “If the Corps can arbitrarily cancel our contracts, what keeps them from canceling the contracts for the county, the cities and the water districts that are on the lake?”

Also speaking Monday night was George Bramlett, Hartwell Lake Project Office Manager and his assistant, Sandy Campbell.

Bramlett told the crowd the decision to ban irrigation came from the top brass at the Pentagon and from Congress who ruled some 50 years ago the reservoirs lake water could only be used for certain purposes and private property irrigation was not one of them.

“Initially, Congress said the water in the reservoirs could only be used for flood control, hydropower, and downstream water quality,” Bramlett told the crowd. “Later Congress expanded that to include fish and wildlife management, recreation and water withdrawal, but they never approved the use of water withdrawal for irrigation.”

Sandy Campbell said only the Cities of Anderson and Lavonia and Hart County have water withdrawal contracts with the Corps of Engineers to take water out of Lake Hartwell and the process to get a contract is long and expensive.

Campbell said she has been working with the Atlantic Division office in Atlanta for four years to find a way to allow the irrigation but could not find any legal means to do so.

“We started looking within this community of practice that does these water supply contracts and all these studies and said, ‘Well surely there’s a way without going through this process to allow the small water users to allow that continue,’” Campbell explained. “The people in the water authority kicked that around for about four years to find a legal way to do that, and there’s no way to do it. You either have a water supply contract or you can’t withdraw water under our Congressional authorities.”

Campbell also blamed the Tri-State water wars as being responsible for the new ban.

But Collins, who started the Corps of Engineers Caucus to deal with Corps lake issues across the country, called that reasoning ludicrous.

“You cannot blame this on the water wars between Georgia, Florida and Alabama,” Collins said. “If it is, then why didn’t they figure this out 25 ago because that’s when the first (water wars) lawsuit was filed. It took 25 years? Really? And the lawsuits, by the way not solved.”

He said the Corps never contacted any member of Congress to let them know of their decision to ban irrigation.

“No public hearing, no notification of Congress, no active input,” Collins said. “Maybe it’s because they (Corps of Engineers) didn’t want to realize they were breaking the law for 50 years. Then, with the excuse I got tonight that it’s the tri-state water wars…where has the (Corps) legal department been for the last 25 years?”

Collins, who lives on Lake Lanier which is also affected by the irrigation ban, he plans to go to the Atlantic Division office of the Corps of Engineers to speak to the officials there.

Collins called on the Corps to be more transparent in their decision making.

Meantime, Frank Redman from Johnny Isakson’s office said the Senator will also be looking into the matter and said the Senator is looking into whether existing property owners with irrigation permits can be grandfathered in.

Collins’ full comments can be heard this Sunday, January 24 at noon on 92.1’s Community Forum.