Some People are going to be Hurt

It has been almost a year since the City of Apalachicola filed a lawsuit against the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers for endangering our way of life by reducing the amount of freshwater flow down the Apalachicola-Chattahoochee-Flint River System.

Early on, the court consolidated the lawsuit with the State of Florida and others into a multidistrict litigation in the U.S. District Court in Jacksonville, Florida.

It has been our position all alone that the U.S. Congress would not resolve this 20-year old water war, but that a resolution would come from the courts.

After taking that position, the City of Apalachicola along with two other small Georgia communities bordering the AFC River Basin mounted separate legal challenges aimed at protecting our community’s natural resources and our way of life. To date, Apalachicola is the only Florida community that felt this issue was important enough to take what is emerging to be the only action that is going to resolve the matter.

The Judge assigned to hear the case, U.S. District Court Judge Paul A. Magnuson has announced that he is set and ready to resolve this issue by January 2009. Judge Magnuson has stated that he must first decide whether the Metro-Atlanta area has the authority to continue using Lake Lanier as its main source of freshwater and that the earlier District Court of Appeals ruling would have a bearing on the current litigation.

The early Appeals Court ruling stated in part that the taking of water from the federal reservoirs at Lake Sidney Lanier for municipal purposes was not an authorized congressional use. Should Judge Magnuson rule accordingly, Atlanta would have to start looking for a new source of drinking water.

This is the same account City Attorney Pat Floyd, reported to the City Commission at our August 5 meeting when he quoted, Judge Magnuson as saying at the July 21 hearing held in Jacksonville, “some people are going to be hurt a lot and some are going to be helped a little”.