Periodic drought in northeast Kansas is not a stranger to any of us who live in this region. Since the 1970s the Kickapoo Tribe has been planning to develop a water storage project on its reservation to provide residents a dependable water supply for present and future housing, economic development, fire protection, and agricultural pursuits at the Tribal farming enterprise. Developable groundwater is not available on the reservation; this was established years ago by both the Kansas and the United States Geological Surveys. The Tribe supported the efforts of the Nemaha Brown Watershed District in those early years to fund and draft in 1978 a General Plan for the development of the Delaware River watershed. In the 1980s and 1990s the Tribe and Nemaha Brown worked cooperatively to jointly plan and propose a storage project at a location on Plum Creek on the Reservation. Congress approved the project in 1998. A dispute erupted over the refusal of some of the landowners to sell their property for the project, and that stalled the project for several years. Over the past decade the Tribe has purchased several parcels of land in the Plum Creek drainage where the project would be located. It will continue those efforts, offering fair market value or land exchanges where possible. In September, after several years of technical negotiations, the Tribe and the State of Kansas’ Department of Agriculture entered into an agreement that sets out the Tribe’s water right and how that water right is to be administered by the State of Kansas on the Delaware River and its tributaries. An important next step is to have the Congress of the United States approve the water right, and the Tribe is working with the Kansas Congressional delegation to draft legislation for that purpose. The Tribe is seeking support for its efforts from local organizations and governments in northeast Kansas.Read More on the Story:
Lester Randall: Kickapoo Tribe looking to move forward in positive directions with its neighbors (The Hiawatha World 5/31)
Related Stories
Kickapoo
Tribe reaches settlement in long-running water dispute (September 8,
2016)
Join the Conversation
