Sen. Mark Christensen

In an amendment offered to replace the original bill, the Department of Natural Resources  would calculate a net use number based on a formula intended to reduce groundwater usage.

When the net use number is negative, users would be required to reduce consumption or increase water supply in the affected basin.

Groundwater usage could be reduced by 50 to 70 percent of the water needed to raise a crop. Surface users would be required to give up 25 percent of the available water to let it flow downstream.

Christensen said the sacrifices were necessary to comply with Nebraska’s water agreement with Kansas. In 1943, Nebraska signed a compact with Kansas and Colorado that required the three states to share the water supply in the Republican River Basin. It is estimated that Nebraska could be 200,000 acre-feet short of the compact’s requirements by the end of this year.

“If we do nothing, we’ll stay out of compliance and a judge will shut us off,” Christensen told the committee. “That would have disastrous effects.”

Steve Smith of WaterClaim, an irrigator advocacy group, said that while he understood the bill would require irrigators to make some painful changes, they would be worth it in the long run.

“We’re willing to lose an arm in order to save our life,” Smith said.

The law would also have allowances for individual users who engage in conservation practices, Smith said.

The bill asks for $2.7 million for the department to comply with the law.

Sen. Tom Carlson

Sen. Tom Carlson of Holdrege said he did not agree with the Legislature setting varying reduction percentages.

“The percentages of reduction start with 19 percent in the west and go all the way to 45 percent in the east end,” Carlson said. “I cannot accept that for the people that I represent.”

Smith said the allocations were based on state Department of Natural Resources allocation charts.

Opponents said allowing the Legislature to set reductions would take away local control.

Jerry Kuenning, a farmer from Imperial, said the natural resources districts were the “only logical structures” for regulating water use.

Carlson introduced another bill aimed at addressing the state’s water issues.

LB 458 would create a vegetation removal program. Vegetation that has a negative impact on fully appropriated or overappropriated areas would be removed to increase stream flow.

Ann Bleed, director of the Natural Resources Department, said the removal of new vegetation growth would conserve scarce water supplies in the Republican and Platte river basins.

Vegetation in river beds has increased since drought has plagued western Nebraska. Bleed said when water was released from the Harlan County reservoir recently, only about half the water released made it through the clogged river to Kansas.

“There’s a cost to doing this, but there’s an even greater cost to not,” Carlson said.