Latest phase of Water Wars plays out in Congress | www.ajc.com

Georgia officials knew their fight wasn’t over when they claimed victory in the long-running legal battle with Alabama and Florida over water rights. Now the next phase of the Neverending Water War is playing out in Congress rather than courtrooms.

A year after the U.S. Supreme Court cemented metro Atlanta’s claim to Lake Lanier’s water supply by letting stand a federal appeals court decision, lawmakers are considering legislation that could circumvent that and impact how millions of Atlanta residents get their drinking water.

The House is preparing this summer to consider a sweeping water bill, and some Florida and Alabama politicians want to insert changes that could make it harder for Atlanta to draw water from federal reservoirs. And Georgia, which only a few years ago pushed for congressional intervention, is warning other states not to interfere.

Florida Gov. Rick Scott is pushing for federal lawmakers to intervene, saying that the fishing industry on the Florida panhandle is “suffering an ecosystem and economic collapse” because of a lack of fresh water from Lake Lanier. He wants legislation “that allows adequate freshwater” to reach the Apalachicola region by blocking the Corps from allocating water to Atlanta without congressional approval.

Florida and Alabama senators attempted to put similar language into the Water Resources and Development Act last month, but Georgia Republicans Johnny Isakson and Saxby Chambliss fended them off by arguing that giving Congress more say over Corps water plans would have a nationwide ripple effect.

The U.S. House is set to consider the same legislation this summer, and the Georgia delegation is wary of the fact that six lawmakers from Florida sit on the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee — and no one on the committee is from Georgia.

U.S. Rep. Doug Collins, a Gainesville Republican, warned that requiring congressional approval of Lanier’s water could be a “poison pill” that could kill wide-ranging legislation that also deals with flood control, port planning and agricultural upgrades.

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