Water War Carries High Price Tag

The costs are mounting as Georgia and Florida continue their legal battle over water rights.

Georgia Gov. Nathan Deal recently issued an executive order stating that "the sum of $4,000,000 be transferred from the Governor's Emergency Fund and credited to the appropriation accounts" for the purposes of funding the state's effort in this dispute.

"Deal’s aides have warned that they may have to dip even deeper into the $11 million emergency fund to continue the legal battle," the Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported.

Georgia had seemed to be winning the showdown, but that all changed last year when the Supreme Court decided to take up the case.

"Georgia won a string of recent court victories in the long-running fight with Florida and Alabama over water rights. But the streak was snapped in November when the U.S. Supreme Court agreed to hear a last-ditch legal maneuver by Florida seeking to limit Georgia’s water withdrawals from the Chattahoochee River to 1992 levels. Back then, metro Atlanta’s population hovered around 3 million people. It now surpasses 5.4 million," the AJC report said.

As the dispute rises to the highest court in the nation, Georgia has been forced to devote more staffers to the issue.

"Georgia is digging in for the latest phase of the courtroom feud. Deal tapped a water czar who will, for the first time, coordinate the state’s efforts. The legal team has flatly rejected Florida’s arguments in court filings. And behind-the-scenes negotiations between the...states grind on," the report continued.

Florida's suit "challenges Georgia’s use of water drawn from the Apalachicola-Chattahoochee-Flint river basin, including Lake Lanier," the Atlanta Journal-Constitution previously reported. The Supreme Court has jurisdiction over state-to-state disputes.

The fight between the two states goes way back, and Georgia has tried to get the case out of court. "Georgia had sought to dismiss the suit, filed last October by Florida Governor Rick Scott, that stems from a decades-old fight over Atlanta's daily demand for 360 million gallons of water from the Chattahoochee and Flint river basins," Reuters reported.

Florida contends that "Atlanta’s suburbs are sucking dry the river flow that feeds the oyster beds and fisheries of the northern Gulf Coast," according to the Wall Street Journal.

For more on state water rights, visit Water Online's Regulations & Legislation Solution Center.