Is economic competition the real reason for the water wars?
Val Perry, the executive vice president of the Lake Lanier Association has said that he feels the true motive behind the water war might be economic competition.
Mr. Perry said “If you can disrupt our water flow and the amount of storage we have, Florida and Alabama would be the beneficiaries of that.”
What do you think?
January 10th, 2008 at 9:26 pm
Yes he is partly correct. If Florida can force the continued flow of 3+ billion gallons of water released daily from Woodruff Dam/Lake Seminole, then Gov. Crist can tell developers there is plenty of water for them. Alabama would also like to continue getting their bloated share of water from Georgia.
January 10th, 2008 at 10:17 pm
On please. Conspirary theory. Get out your tin foil hats folks.
January 10th, 2008 at 11:39 pm
It’s not so far fetched. States are constantly competing to bring in new manufacturing plants, fortune 500 headquarters, etc. It is very common to offer “incentive packages” aka corporate welfare to lure big businesses. It’s a little naive to assume motives are completely pure when bad fortune for Georgia can be good fortune for neighboring states.
January 11th, 2008 at 3:15 am
There is certainly a concern of economic competition at play in the water wars. Look into “prior appropriation” — a doctrine of water rights that allocates water according to the first user to put it to use. In this case, As Atlanta was the first major city to develop (and is thus more economically powerful), they have more clout according to prior apportionment, and can exercise control of shared waterways.
At this stage, Atlanta is factoring in its own “future” growth into its demands. At the same time, other users downstream would ideally like to secure guarantees of water surplus to account for future growth and development. I would say, for certain, “economic competition” is at the very heart of the ACF/ACT disupte.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prior_appropriation_water_rights
-st
January 11th, 2008 at 9:35 am
See the jack nicholson movie “chinatown”
January 11th, 2008 at 9:48 am
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_Water_Wars
“The aqueduct was sold to the citizens of Los Angeles as vital to the growth of the city. However, unknown to the public, the initial water would be used to irrigate the San Fernando Valley to the north, which was not at the time a part of the city. A syndicate of investors (again, close friends of Eaton, including Harrison Gray Otis) bought up large tracts of land in the San Fernando Valley with this inside information.[6] This syndicate made substantial efforts to the passage of the bond issue that funded the aqueduct, including creating a false drought (by manipulating rainfall totals) and publishing scare articles in the Los Angeles Times, which Otis published.”
Big business can be very ruthless when it comes to making money. You have pharmacutical companies fudging data so they can release dangerous drugs. You have teams of psychoanalysts advising advertising agencies on how to brainwash you into buying their products. The list goes on and on.
While the lack of rain is the main cause of this problem, i will bet there are people trying to make money off this crisis. If you could run atlanta dry, then land values will plummet and investors could buy everything for pennies on the dollar. Then by the time the drought is over and a new reservior is built they will make billions.
January 11th, 2008 at 5:48 pm
I think you are missing the point a little John. This isn’t about businesses other than the fact that business tend to relocate to desirable locations and places that will give them land, tax incentives, etc to relocate. Nothing unethical about that for businesses.
The problem is that we have three states that are supposed to be negotiating in good faith to find the most beneficial outcome for all. In other words cooperating for the greater good. If one or two of those states has a motive to deny water to the others, that is entirely different. I would go so far as to say it’s despicable and I don’t doubt that it’s happening.
January 11th, 2008 at 6:57 pm
ST,
Prior appropriation water rights apply to western states. Eastern states, including GA, AL, and FL, recognize riparian water rights where rights are based on possession of land adjacent to the stream. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Riparian_water_rights and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_groundwater_law. I don’t think prior rights apply to ACF/ACT, but then IANAL.
January 11th, 2008 at 7:00 pm
For some reason, my second link above did not work. Try
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_groundwater_law
January 11th, 2008 at 9:27 pm
True that the east US have leaned more towards riparian doctrine, but these are just general tendencies.
Regardless, economic competition is behind the arguments of all three players in the water wars. All wish to have water set aside for their projected growth, to attract new industry and residents.
January 11th, 2008 at 10:46 pm
rich, the article states well known facts. To publish an article that states “economics may be at heart of water wars” is almost stupid. Everyone knows that money drives everything, that is a given, even to suggest it is dumb. It is obvious. I was talking about possible conspiracy theorys.
Oh well.
I live in daytona beach now so I hope it works out for everyone, i hear you got lots of rain.
January 12th, 2008 at 9:27 pm
John > not enough rain to make any difference for refilling Lake Lanier, but it keeps our yard plants and trees alive for now.
January 12th, 2008 at 9:29 pm
I used to live in Daytona Beach, but after that horrible year of hurricanes I moved away to Georgia. If I am forced to move again, then it will be a location and state with plenty of water.
January 14th, 2008 at 5:38 pm
John - again you missed the point. There is a difference between Alabama and Florida wanting more water to meet their needs, and wanting Georgia to have less water so it suffers. Both are economic motives, but they would never admit the latter motive because it is ugly and reflects very poorly on them.