The Sierra Club Toiyabe Chapter was one entity which provided funding to help pay the litigation costs of the Walker Lake legal struggle, and it is paying off!
Walker Lake Working Group (WLWG), a 501c3 nonprofit group working to restore Walker Lake, near Hawthorne, Nevada, has some good news on the legal front. On August 5, 2022 Miranda M. Du, Chief United States District Judge in Reno, Nevada, denied the Walker River Irrigation District’s effort to dismiss Walker Lake Working Group and Mineral County’s Second Amended Complaint in Intervention. In lay people’s language, that decision means WLWG’s Public Trust Doctrine case keeps moving forward.
“She delivered a complete legal victory for us on every one of those legal issues,” said WLWG attorney Simeon Herskovitz. Prior to that decision, the District Court agreed to WLWG’s motion to allow legal service by publication. The court decision brings WLWG to near completion of a 30-year effort to legally notify all the Walker River Basin water rights owners of the litigation to save Walker Lake. The court had previously required that Herskovitz’s team notify each individual water rights holder – a cumbersome process to complete with thousands of Basin water rights holders and successors.
The completed service will allow the court governing water allocation in the Basin to finally hear the merits of the claim to save Walker Lake for the public’s benefit -wildlife habitat and recreation. After an elongated detour to the US Ninth Circuit’s Court of Appeals and Nevada Supreme Court, the District Court is being asked to rule on how it will fulfill its Public Trust duty to the public.
In its landmark 2020 Public Trust decision, the Nevada Supreme Court ruled that the Public Trust Doctrine is embedded in Nevada’s constitution and water code, and applies to all water and water rights in Nevada. The Public Trust Doctrine is the principle that the government must protect and maintain certain natural resources for public use.
The US District Court now has the unique challenge to recognize Nevada’s high court’s affirmation of the Public Trust Doctrine while enforcing the state’s rule that Nevada’s policy of water rights finality forbids reallocation of existing water rights. The district court must address how to fulfill the Public Trust Doctrine and appropriative water rights short of reallocation. WLWG maintains that the district court can reconcile the Public Trust Doctrine with Nevada’s policy on the finality of water rights through other conservation and restore Walker Lake.
Upstream diversions of the West Walker River and East Walker River for agriculture and other uses has shrunken Walker Lake to the point where it can no longer sustain the once-thriving Lahontan Cutthroat and Tui chub populations. An annual loon festival was cancelled years ago because the birds quit coming to Walker Lake due to declining water levels and the resultant fish die-off.
WLWG is a grass roots organization based in Hawthorne, Nevada. It has received funding to help pay the litigation costs of the Walker Lake legal struggle from the Sierra Club, individuals and other entities. Persons wanting more information about WLWG may contact President Glenn Bunch at 775 945-2289 or email him at walkerlakesave@gmail.com