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November 14, 2009

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Fallon, Churchill County, appeal water transfers to wildlife refuge

Friday, Jan. 12, 2001 | 4:21 a.m.

The local governments contend the water transfers approved by State Engineer Hugh Ricci will impair existing water rights owned by the city and county and could threaten residential water supplies.

The city maintains that irrigation of farmland recharges aquifers the city pumps for drinking water. Officials are concerned that taking those lands out of production by selling the water rights to the federal agency could diminish groundwater supplies.

Steve King, Fallon assistant city attorney, said the state engineer has authority to require the federal wildlife agency to prove the water right transfers will not harm other existing rights.

"We ask that the decision be reversed and go back to the the state engineer to consider Nevada law," King said of the appeal filed in U.S. District Court in Reno.

In his ruling, Ricci said the city and county failed to show how the transfers would harm their water supplies. He also said the city's underground water rights are junior to the water rights purchase by the federal agency, the Lahontan Valley News and Fallon Eagle Standard reported.

Federal legislation passed in 1990 authorized the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to buy up to 75,000 acre-feet of irrigation water to maintain 25,000 acres of wetlands in the Lahontan Valley.

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