An attempt to revive legislation aimed at stopping the Marvin Nichols Reservoir project failed in the House on Tuesday.
The proposed reservoir would deliver drinking water to the Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex but would require the use of eminent domain to acquire nearly 200,000 acres in East Texas for the project. That threat has drawn opposition from area residents.
First included in the state’s water plan in 1984, it wasn’t until 2001 that the DFW-area Region C Water Planning Group began to push for action regarding the Marvin Nichols Reservoir project. The project would require nearly 70,000 acres for the reservoir itself, along with another 130,000 acres to offset environmental impact.
House Bill 2109 by State Rep. Gary VanDeaver (R–New Boston), which would have removed the Marvin Nichols project from the state water plan, never made it to the House floor for a vote. It died in the House Calendars Committee along with numerous other House bills, despite being passed by the Natural Resource Committee in late April.
On Tuesday, VanDeaver presented the issue to House members in the form of an amendment to Senate Bill 1261 that would have accomplished the same goal as HB 2109.
After much debate, the amendment failed in a 45-91 vote.
VanDeaver’s amendment would have removed water plans that lacked action toward their construction within 50 years of being added to the state’s water plan. After being removed from the state’s water plan, the particular project could not be eligible for inclusion in any future water plans.
“Fifty-seven years, generations of hard-working Texans have been held hostage by the threat that someday, in the future, to be determined by people 100 miles away, their land will be taken from them,” stated VanDeaver when laying out HB 2109 in the Natural Resources Committee.
“Fifty-seven years, these Texans have been apprehensive to build a home, a barn, a new fence, because this threat of eminent domain has been hanging over them like a cloud.”
At the committee hearing in April, many East Texas residents voiced their concerns about the project’s effects on residents, wildlife, and both the agricultural and timber industries in the area.
“House Bill 2109 is needed,” said Stanley Jesse. “It’s needed to help fix a flaw in the state water planning process, a flaw that has let the threat of a proposed reservoir hold the people in northeast Texas hostage for over 50 years.”
At the beginning of the legislative session, the Texas Water Development Board gave Gov. Greg Abbott and the Legislative Budget Board a feasibility report of the Marvin Nichols Project for review. The report found the project to be operable.
