Week 7 of the Nevada Legislature included two major water bills to come before the Senate Natural Resources Committee.  On March 23^rd, SB 112 and SB 176 were heard by the committee.

Senate Bill 112 deals with basin accounts for designated basins where the State Engineer has determined that fees are necessary to be raised for activities associated with managing the basin.  If adopted, SB 112 would limit the ways the funds could be spent and also would establish a greater transparency in how the funds are spent.  Every year the State Engineer would be required to provide a report to the County Commissioners where the fees are being assessed, telling them how the funds were spent.  Nevada Farm Bureau policy supports passage of the bill and offered this testimony on SB 112.

Senate Bill 176 is a proposal to establish and initially fund a program for the purchase of water rights from willing sellers in over-pumped groundwater basins with those purchased water rights to be retired.  This program would provide a tool for doing something about the over-pumped and over appropriated groundwater basins in the state.  Farm Bureau policy supports this approach in dealing with what has become a very serious problem, where nearly half of the state’s groundwater basins are over-appropriated and about 20 percent of the basins being over-pumped.

This is Nevada Farm Bureau’s testimony on SB 176 spoke in support of passage of the bill.

The Nevada Department of Agriculture (NDA) is seeking information on the needs of farmers and ranchers experiencing extreme winter weather conditions. Anyone who has been impacted is encouraged to submit photos and brief descriptions of the conditions and challenges to NDAEmergency@agri.nv.gov and work with their local emergency manager. 

The NDA will use these on-the-ground reports to work with federal partners to identify potential assistance and resources to support Nevada’s agriculture communities. Reports can range from difficulty accessing livestock, limited feed supplies and resources, structure failure, pasture or field loss, etc. 

“Thank you for your dedication to your livestock and operations during this challenging time,” said NDA Director JJ Goicoechea. “Please be safe and we hope to have assistance options and resources available soon.”

Please email photos and descriptions to NDAEmergency@agri.nv.gov to share your experience and work with your local emergency manager. 

March 20^th is the deadline for introductions of legislation by Legislators.  At this writing we have not come across any new introductions of bills in the Nevada Assembly which we’ve added to the list of bills we are monitoring in that body. 

Since our last report of new legislation, these bills of interest to Nevada Farm Bureau have been added to the list of Bills:

AB 325 –  This bill is brought forward by Assemblyman P.K. O’Neill of Carson City and would change the way in which temporary water rights are dealt with in federal Bureau of Reclamation (BOR) irrigation districts.  The bill states that temporary changes to the place of diversion, manner of use or place of use of water are not required to be approved by the State Engineer within the BOR irrigation districts and also authorizes the State Engineer to accept certain nonconforming maps connected to the BOR irrigation districts.

AB 349 – This is another bill from Assemblyman P.K. O’Neill and, if adopted, will establish a Nevada Wildlife Conservation Program and Nevada Wildlife Conservation Program Account to support the preservation, protection, management and restoration of wildlife and wildlife habitats.

In addition to any direct legislative appropriation, the Department of Wildlife is authorized to apply for and accept any gift, grant, bequest, donation for deposit in the Account and use by the Program. The money in the Account must be used in accordance with any recommendations of the Board of the Nevada Wildlife Conservation Program.  This bill makes a conforming change to provide that money received by the Department for the Nevada Wildlife Conservation Program Account is not required to be deposited in the Wildlife Account in the State General Fund.

AB 387 –  This is a major piece of legislation that has been in limbo since the Interim Joint Natural Resources Committee identified the topic of “Conjunctive Management” as a bill draft they wanted to bring to this session.  The chair of the Interim Joint Natural Resources Committee, Assemblyman Howard Watts has brought forward the language he felt had the most consensus of several different concepts.  Technically, the bill was introduced by the Assembly Natural Resources Committee.

AB 387 seeks to replace the current language in state law, stating the intent of the Legislature on best available science, and move this into actual groundwater law to manage with best available science.  The bill would also clearly state that there are hydrological connections between groundwater basins.  The intention for this legislation is to maintain all of the key tenets of water law while recognizing that conflicts with rights can occur from a connected basin.  If the connection were to be proved, management should be carried out to conform with priority and other tenets of existing law in the same manner as if they were happening in a single basin.

SB 342 - The primary sponsor for this bill is Senator Pete Goicoechea of Eureka.  If enacted, this measure will create the funding for a program at Utah State University to provide stipends for the costs of the out-of-state portion of tuition for 70 residents of the State of Nevada to earn a degree of doctor of veterinary medicine from the College of Veterinary Medicine at Utah State University for a ten year period starting July 1, 2024.