This story by Allison Kite and Kevin Hardy appeared on Colorado Newsline on June 15, 2024. We are sharing it in two parts.
Between the 1950s and the 1970s, Kansas created the fundamental problem that allows aquifer depletion, by granting farmers the right to pump more water out of the aquifer each year than returns to it via rainfall. But the state has largely left it up to locals to find solutions to the problem.
The state charged the three groundwater management districts over the Ogallala with protecting both the agricultural economy and aquifer water. But their five-decade histories have been marked primarily by further decline of the Ogallala Aquifer. Two districts have made progress in recent years and helped farmers to slow, or even stop, the decline.
GMD 3 is different.
Burke Griggs, a water attorney who previously worked for the state, argues the southwest Kansas district isn’t doing much compared with the other two.
“The law is the same. The regs are basically the same,” he said. “This is a cultural thing.”
He argues the state should take a firmer stance in aquifer management.
“I think it’s time for a reckoning,” Griggs said.
District officials say farmers in GMD 3 have used 13% less water in the past 10 years compared with the decade before. But it’s unclear how much of that change is intentional — from conservation — or a reflection of the limited water available in the declining aquifer.
Though its territory is twice the size of the other two districts’ combined, the southwest Kansas district hasn’t accomplished as much. The other districts have offered financial assistance to farmers investing in water-efficient irrigation systems and championed large-scale restrictions on pumping.
GMD 3 has done none of that. Between 2010 and 2022, financial records show, the district spent, on average, only 13% of the money it budgeted for conservation. In most years, it didn’t spend anything on conservation.
Mark Rude, who has been the organization’s executive director for nearly two decades, said the district’s entire budget supports water conservation. The district takes in more than $1 million per year and spends 70% of that on salaries and benefits, according to financial documents received through a records request. The rest goes largely to office equipment, travel and other administrative costs.
“I mean, ultimately, that’s why we’re here,” Rude said, “and if you look at the $600,000-plus we (spend) on staff, why is the staff here?”
This summer, the district board will consider a 38% increase in the fee it imposes on water users, which is expected to raise more than $200,000 each year. Rude said that money would primarily be used to hire two new employees to help with grant projects offering technical assistance to farmers trying to conserve water.
Between 2010 and 2022, GMD 3 spent about four times as much on travel for Rude and staff as on water conservation. On average, the GMD pays more than $20,000 each year for Rude’s travel — plus another $20,000 for the rest of its staff members — compared with $10,000 for water conservation.
Last year, the district changed its financial statements, reporting fewer, broader categories. The new financial structure did not distinguish travel costs from other expenses.
Rude defends the spending by saying it’s necessary to build the partnerships and relationships needed to achieve district goals, including its aim of piping in water from out of state.
“How else do you do it?” Rude said. “Really, please show us: How else do you do it?”
Last year, lawmakers from both sides of the aisle questioned Rude during a committee hearing on why the district wasn’t doing more to conserve groundwater.
State Rep. Lindsay Vaughn, an Overland Park Democrat, said during a legislative hearing that the district had 50 years to act but made no progress on addressing aquifer decline.
“The issue is only becoming more urgent,” Vaughn said, “and I am discouraged to see that there aren’t any real efforts right now to get the ball rolling and coming up with a long-term plan.”
The district’s lack of action also has drawn the attention of farmers who mounted a campaign to secede.
In 2022, Hamilton County farmers submitted a petition to withdraw from the groundwater district.
They characterized the organization as a bureaucratic mess with a ballooning budget that spends little on conservation, obstructs programs meant to slow groundwater decline and provides no benefits for dryland farmers who also pay assessments.
The petition criticized groundwater district leaders’ fixation on building an aqueduct across the state. The organization twice has trucked water 400 miles from the Missouri River to western Kansas in an effort to sell the idea.
In their petition, Hamilton County farmers said the project only managed to move and dump water with “no tangible benefit to anyone.”
Richard Geven, owner of the 10,000-head Southwest Plains Dairy, was among those who signed the petition to leave.
Geven, a native of the Netherlands who has been farming here for nearly 20 years, said he sees little reason for the groundwater district. When he has issues with his wells or needs clarity on water rights, he works with state regulators.
But he pays assessments every year to the district.
“We don’t know what the purpose is,” he said. “We think, ‘What are they doing? We don’t need them.’”
‘They will face the same choices’
Across most of the Ogallala states, governments have preferred to encourage voluntary conservation rather than mandating steep cutbacks, said Kevin Wagner, director of the Oklahoma Water Resource Center at Oklahoma State University.
Oklahoma allows farmers to use up to 2 feet of water each year on every acre they own. But usage is not monitored. Farmers report annual estimates of water usage.
And the state has not banned the drilling of new irrigation wells.
Researchers have closely monitored the decline of the aquifer across the Oklahoma Panhandle — it’s dropping about half a foot per year, he said.
But there’s no telling how much individual farmers are using or conserving.
“When I talk to producers in Oklahoma, there’s a lot of feeling that Oklahoma producers are doing just as good at conserving as their neighbors in Texas and in Kansas,” Wagner said. “And honestly there’s no data out there right now.”
Oklahoma state Rep. Carl Newton, a Republican, introduced legislation this year that would require irrigators to meter their water use.
The measure passed, but amid steep opposition from agriculture trade groups, Republican Gov. Kevin Stitt vetoed it. He called it government overreach and a violation of private property rights.
Newton said he plans to reintroduce the bill, which he described as “a starting point” for conservation efforts.
“You’ve got to find out where your problem is to get an idea of where to go,” he said. “That was my whole goal.”
Kansas started requiring irrigators to install meters and report water usage in the early 1990s.
Formal conservation efforts have been underway in other parts of the region for years.
In Nebraska’s Republican River Basin, groundwater regulators have helped producers install soil moisture probes and more accurate meters that use telemetry to conserve. And Colorado offers a master irrigator course to help farmers grow crops more efficiently.
In Wichita County, Kansas, just beyond the bounds of GMD 3, farmers created a conservation program that launched in 2021. Called a local enhanced management area, farmers committed to cutting water use by at least 25%.
Farmer Don Smith said the program provided a chance for locals to act together before the state stepped in.
Smith, his brother and nephews together run Smith Family Farms, which grows corn, wheat and milo against a backdrop of massive wind turbines. Shiny grain bins emblazoned with the family name tower near the office, where a curious Australian shepherd keeps watch, rearing up on hind legs to peer through the door.
The farm is mostly dryland. Its irrigated fields draw upon 38 wells, connected to advanced sprinkler systems that help reduce water use. The farm also has transitioned to no-till methods, which keeps more moisture in the soil.
Smith said the farm shows that growers can save water and still make money. Lower water use does lead to lower yields, he said. But it also makes growing crops less expensive.
Smith knows the groundwater district just to his south has deeper wells and more abundant water. But the declining aquifer eventually will force changes there.
“I guess it’ll be interesting to see if at some point somebody responds before the gun’s to their head,” he said. “They will face the same choices we all north of them have had to face.”
In Wichita County, Smith said, test wells show the changes have slowed or even reversed aquifer decline. But even so, he doesn’t think irrigated farming will last forever. He expects the day will come when pumping small amounts of water won’t be worth the cost.
“We all understand that we are sucking water out of a bathtub,” he said. “And the rate we’re taking it out of the bathtub exceeds the rate Mother Nature can put it back in.”