GWMA solicits support for aquifer protection area

MOSES LAKE - The Columbia Basin Groundwater Management Area (GWMA) is asking local cities to back a plan to create a taxpayer funded aquifer protection area.

Paul Stoker, executive director of GWMA, recently requested Moses Lake officials send a letter to Grant County commissioners expressing support for the protection area, which would draw funding from an annual assessment.

The agency was formed 15 years ago to provide groundwater planning, information and consulting services to Grant, Adams, Franklin and Lincoln counties.

Over the past several months, Stoker has given presentations to city governments throughout the four-county region, detailing how GWMA's state and federal funding sources are becoming increasingly unreliable.

"As I explained during those meetings, the GWMA's work has been funded since 1997 solely through state and federal appropriations and these resources have become extremely limited," Stoker wrote in a letter to Moses Lake. "Therefore, without local support, the work of the GWMA will not be able to continue."

County commissioners must choose whether to put a proposed per-household or per-parcel assessment on the ballot this fall, Stoker said.

Moses Lake City Manager Joe Gavinski said he's been in contact with Stoker and other GWMA officials, telling them at this point there's "not a huge amount of interest on the part of council" in supporting a ballot measure. The city has also heard little on the issue from Grant County commissioners themselves, he said.

"We know (GWMA) is very interested in having the county commissioners suggest the idea of an aquifer protection area on the ballot in November, and they're talking about having to do that in all of the four counties," he said. "Any city that would be included in the protection area would have to opt in. There's just a lot left to be discussed."

Gavinski suggested the issue could be raised by local leaders at a Association of Grant County Cities and Towns meeting later this month.

Only two aquifer protection areas currently exist in the state - one in Spokane and another in Renton - but both were created for entirely different purposes than what GWMA has proposed, according to Gavinski.

"My information tells me this would be a first," he said.