Cherokee County citizens are urged to keep abreast of the continuing water waters with Alabama and Georgia. Although the water dispute hasn’t been at the forefront of the news in recent months, the battle rages on.

Shad Ellis, president, and Jerry Culberson, secretary/treasurer, Weiss Lake Improvement Association, discussed the ongoing water wars during WLIA’s recently annual meeting held at Real Pit Barbecue.

“I do know that Florida has decided to go to the Supreme Court to resolve their issue between metro Atlanta and Florida,” said Ellis. “Our governor, to my knowledge, has not made any changes from Gov. Siegelman’s term. I’ve visited with him several times about our concerns and Atlanta taking our water from us. That’s something we need to spend a lot of time on.”

“We try to stay as positive as we can about Weiss Lake,” said Culberson. “Basically, Florida said, ‘Georgia, no we don’t like the agreements because the agreements say Georgia can use whatever they want basically and whatever is left they might send on down to Florida.’ Alabama said okay! The agreement said that Georgia could use all the water they needed to use for reasonable use with no definition of reasonable use, with no minimum flow standards for the Coosa River. The Coosa River today, on average, day in and day out, is 6,800 to 7,000 cubic feet per second and they are wanting to only guarantee us, except in times of drought, and then there is no guarantee, they are will to guarantee us about 1,200 cubic feet per second. That’s an 80 percent reduction in flow. If you have 80 percent less water coming in, but you have the same amount of pollution coming in, what water is still there will become five times as polluted.”

This will mean that more cities and various municipalities will have to shell out for additional chemicals to be used in treating their water supply, Culberson pointed out.

“They may even have to extend their pipes that they are pulling out of the river out further,” said Culberson. “Where they are at now may be dry. We’re going to have these pollution and water well problems. And of course, our recreation wouldn’t fare very well. This is a big issue and Atlanta is just holding firm. It is their water, it comes out of the mountains in Georgia, they claim, and they can do with it what they want. Basically, they just lay claim to it and we don’t really have any claim. Our new governor has said that sounds fair to him and he is ready to sign off on it. Florida said no.”

It’s possible that Florida’s pull-out will make any tri-state compacts null and void, Culberson said.

“So this issue is probably going to go to the Supreme Court,” said Culberson. “The only bad thing about that is, here in Cherokee County we have 20,000 citizens, Atlanta has maybe 5 million. I think they can round up more money in their buckets that we can. Unfortunately, in politics and government, it is usually money and votes that gets things done. We’re a little behind on both of those. So this is going to be drawn out for many, many years to come.”

WLIA, Ellis said, feels some type of compact or resolution needs to be in place. There are several phrases in the current resolution that need to be purged, he said.

“I understand Atlanta loses at least 100 million a day through leaky pipes and infrastructure and that is basically what they are wanting from us,” said Ellis. “Forty years ago when we built this dam, we didn’t have computers, didn’t have this, didn’t have that. It’s just time for all of these water resource people to hold hands from where we start and where we go to the ocean. It’s just got to be that way. They’ve got to somehow get along and make this thing happen with a tri-state agreement.