Governors Declare Progress Made in Water Dispute

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. — After five hours of "candid" discussions, the governors of Georgia, Florida and Alabama agreed Monday to a framework for resolving the tri-state water dispute with a deadline of Feb. 15.

"The meeting was very beneficial, very candid and at times very blunt," said U.S. Secretary of Interior Dirk Kempthorne, who is helping to mediate the issue. "These governors are serious and intent about finding a solution."

Technical specialists and policy-makers from each state will travel to Washington, D.C., to meet with federal officials in January with an aim of hammering out a drought emergency plan by the mid-February deadline, Kempthorne said.

If the deadlines are not met, the federal government will need to write the emergency plan without the states, "and that should not happen," he added.

Each of the three governors praised the spirit of cooperation at the meeting and said progress was made, although it was clear that serious differences still exist in the two-decade-old dispute.

"I believe we sense today a commitment from the Secretary of the Interior, from the Fish and Wildlife Service, from the Corps of Engineers, as well as the three governors, that working together we can resolve this issue that's been lingering among our states for many, many years," Georgia Gov. Sonny Perdue said. "I'm hopeful ... I think the first step in this is the kind of conversation that we had today, which was candid, frank and productive."

With the southeast enduring a record drought, Atlanta residents are facing growing fears about their drinking water supplies, which come primarily from Lake Lanier and the Chattahoochee River system. Downstream water-users in Alabama and Florida, however, are also concerned about their own shares of the river's flow.

The drought has brought the long-running controversy to a head.

The three governors met with Kempthorne in Washington on Nov. 1 and appeared to have reached an agreement to reduce the river system's flow, but a week after that meeting Florida officials objected, saying the move would throw the lucrative Florida Gulf seafood industry further into crisis.

The flow was reduced in late November, however, after the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, which reviews the potential impacts on creatures living in the water, agreed to the measure. Florida has pressed since then to restore the flow as quickly as possible.

Florida Gov. Charlie Crist said the parties agreed Monday to move a target date of June 1 for restoring the flow to March 15, an apparent concession to oystermen worried about the need for freshwater, considered vital for the marine animals during their spawning season.

Georgia Gov. Sonny Perdue, however, said he believed the Feb. 15 deadline imposed by Kempthorne would mean the March date mentioned by Crist would be moot. Hopefully by then, Perdue said, the three states will have "a workable system that we all agree to ... essentially muting any kind of date-related timelines at all."

Alabama Gov. Bob Riley declared the meeting one of the most productive he's ever participated in, either as his state's chief executive or while serving in Congress.

"A lot of it is due to the leadership of our secretary of the interior," Riley said. "He not only has given us a framework to work through, he's also given us a very aggressive time frame that we have to live up to."

With weather forecasters saying the drought is far from over, the pressure on the governors to strike a deal in the coming two months seems likely to grow.

But the group seemed optimistic and determined to reach an agreement, despite deep divisions sparked by each governor's need to protect his own state's interests.

"The discussion today helped fill out what the agenda will be at the D.C. meeting," Kempthorne said. "The fact that you had different interpretations by the different states ... that's what leads to some real candid conversation. If we don't see the world from the same view, we'll never agree. Today, we started to get closer to agreement."

Perdue said the drought has produced a short-term crisis, but the governors are working toward a long-term solution.

"The biggest issue for all three states is how we fairly and adequately allocate a resource as vital and precious as water in times of scarcity," he said. "What is a protocol going forward in managing these watersheds as a system that gives us predictability when certain climate factors happen? How do we governors come together with our federal partners ... to determine a protocol of how the water is shared? We're making progress in the facts of how to get there."