BLM challenges state’s water rights law

Brendan Riley

Thursday, Sept. 14, 2000 | 4:04 a.m.

CARSON CITY, Nev. - The Nevada Supreme Court was urged Thursday to overturn a state law barring the U.S. Bureau of Land Management from holding stockwatering permits on BLM-controlled public lands.

Justice Department lawyer Andrew Mergen argued the 1995 state law is discriminatory and unconstitutional, and the case could advance to the U.S. Supreme Court if the BLM loses in Nevada's highest court.

But Deputy Nevada Attorney General Marta Adams argued the law is needed to protect state sovereignty and the livestock industry, and justices should preserve a 1995 Douglas County District Court ruling against the BLM.

District Judge Dave Gamble's decision upheld the law and a 1994 order by the state water engineer that denied BLM stockwater applications on nine Douglas County springs. Those applications were among more than 100 such water requests by the federal agency around the state.

The BLM, which controls two-thirds of the land in Nevada, maintains the state law stems from paranoia that existed throughout the West when federal rangeland reform rules were under consideration.

"We have no voice in a democratic process," Mergen told the Supreme Court, insisting that the BLM was unfairly singled out by the state law and had no plans to control as many water rights as possible.

But Adams said that's the way many Nevadans viewed the BLM efforts involving the stockwater rights, adding that water rights have been traditionally relegated to the states.

Mergen, responding to questions from Chief Justice Bob Rose, also said the BLM has no plans to run its own cattle or sheep herds on public lands. But he said that holding the stockwater rights enhances its management efforts.

But Adams said the BLM already can get other water rights for wild horses and burros and for recreation uses on public lands - and so there's "no real impediment" to accomplishing its main goals.

The high court will issue a ruling at a later date.