Section of Environment, Energy, and Resources

Water Resources Committee

2009-2010 Committee Chair:

Wendy Bowden Crowther, Clyde Snow & Sessions, Salt Lake City, UT

28th Annual Water Law Conference

February 17-19, 2010
US Grant
San Diego, CA

The Water Law Conference is targeted towards lawyers, engineers, policy makers, and water managers with interest in the protection, development, and allocation of water rights and water resources, or those who participate in the management of surface and groundwater resources. It will be of value to all persons involved in water right issues, including those with private, municipal, agricultural, and tribal water rights. The conference is open to any interested persons, and is not limited to lawyers. (more)

2008-2009 Committee Awards

This Committee was recognized with the following awards within the Energy and Resources Committees. (more)

• 2008-2009 Best Newsletters Award
• 2008-2009 Best Programs Award

Message from the Vice Chair for Public Service

It is my pleasure to serve as the Vice Chair for Public Service for the Water Resources Committee. I feel it is our obligation and privilege, as lawyers, to give back to the communities in which we live, work, and recreate. As part of the Eastern Water Law Conference, the planning committee is organizing an excellent service project at the Nature Conservancy’s Disney Wilderness Preserve. The service project for the Western Water Law Conference will be in San Diego’s famous Balboa Park. Given the breadth of experience of our members, these projects are just the beginning of the service we can perform. Members of the committee also may get involved in the many ongoing public service projects of the Section of Environment, Energy, and Resources. If any members have additional ideas for serving our communities, please pass them along to me. Together, with our energy, passion, and specialized skills, we can better our world.

Jon Schutz

2010 Eastern Water Resources Conference - Surplus and Scarcity: Adapting to Hydrologic Disruption in the East

May 20-21, 2010
Walt Disney World Dolphin Resort
Orlando, FL

The Eastern Water Resources Conference will be of interest to anyone involved in water issues in the eastern United States, including lawyers, consultants, developers, businesses utilizing large quantities of waters, public utilities, government policy makers and planners, tribal governments and academics. (more)

Message from the Chair

As water lawyers, we’re privileged to work on projects that can make a difference in our world as our profession, our Nation and our world struggle to come to grips with the many changes being wrought by global climate change. In that spirit, our Committee – in collaboration with many other committees in the Section – has just planned and conducted a major plenary session at the Fall Meeting earlier this month in Phoenix. The Fall Meeting program describes this panel as follows:

“What does the law do when natural resources are stretched to the limit? In some watersheds, protection of endangered species, urban development demands, and enduring agricultural discharges have combined to push water resources to the limit. Scarce water supplies are further threatened by projected declines in snowpacks and rainfall. Climate change introduces risks of such fundamental transformation that the water system may no longer be able to provide for existing demands, let alone new demands from development. Several important watersheds face this new set of challenges: California’s Sacramento—San Joaquin Delta, the Apalachicola, Chattachoochee and Flint (ACF) basin, and the Southwest’s Colorado River. Conflicts—and conflict resolution efforts—related to these resources have raged for decades and, during droughts, the legal battles have become even more intense. What tools do lawyers have within the existing legal framework to address these questions? Are these tools inadequate, outdated, or simply irrelevant? How can the legal process— and lawyers serving clients of all sorts— assist society and the environment in solving these problems? What are the implications of our legal system’s ability— or inability—to adapt for the future of resource management and environmental protection in the 21st century? These questions and more will be addressed
by this panel of experts.”

I am pleased to report to you that the panel was very well-received and provided an excellent blend of scientific information (from Professor Michael Hanemann of the University of California, Berkeley), thoughtful evaluation of major changes in water resources management regimes (from Professor Hanemann and Professor Denise Fort of the University of New Mexico) and descriptions of on-going litigation (Jim Banks, who represents the State of Florida in the Apalachicola-Chattachoochee-Flint litigation) and potential litigation (Kevin O’Brien, who represents interests in the Sacramento Valley in connection with the crisis in the San Francisco Bay/Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta Estuary). We were fortunate to have been able to enlist the Honorable Ronald Robie, who is the expert on water law on the California bench, to serve as moderator of the panel and to have the services of Alf Brandt, who is the chief consultant to the California Assembly’s Water Park & Wildlife Committee, to assist the speakers.

The importance of the intersection of water resources and climate change was recently underscored by an article in this month’s ABA Journal entitled “Gulp.” The article points out the challenges that climate change poses for water resources management and highlights the ways in which we as a profession will need to work collaboratively to address these challenges.

As the weather turns cooler, my hope for all of you is for more rain (and eventually snow) while we pursue these many hot topics.

About the Committee

The Water Resources Committee focuses primarily on substantive and practice developments that impact water allocation and availability. These fall into a broad spectrum of subject areas, including state water law; federal and tribal water law; issues arising under the Endangered Species Act and the Clean Water Act; interstate allocation of water; the Public Trust Doctrine; reserved water rights; state, local and municipal planning of water supplies; and federal reclamation law.

The Committee provides information to its members through several means, including the annual water law conference; the Committee newsletter; brown bag programs and other forms of programming not involving formal conferences; solicitation of books and of articles for Trends and Natural Resources and Environment; and its contribution to Year in Review.

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