The Supreme Court ruled Wednesday that Florida has sufficient claims in a decades-old fight with Georgia over the water it gets from the Apalachicola-Chattahoochee-Flint River Basin.
But the fight will continue until a special master appointed by the court can verify Florida’s claims that it needs more water from the basin, which the court found plausible in Wednesday’s ruling.
The 5-4 decision ruled that the court’s “Special Master” used “too strict a standard” in concluding that Florida had failed to meet its initial burden of demonstrating that the high court could “eventually fashion an effective equitable decree” in favor of its water rights.
“Further findings … are needed on all of these evidentiary issues,” Justice Stephen Breyer wrote for the majority. “Florida will be entitled to a decree only if it is shown that ‘the benefits of the [apportionment] substantially outweigh the harm that might result.’”
The two states have been fighting for decades over the use of water in the Apalachicola-Chattahoochee-Flint River Basin that begins in northeast Georgia. A plan was established in 1958 to distribute the water, with Georgia getting 74 percent, Florida getting 11 percent, and Alabama 15 percent.
In Florida v. Georgia, Florida wanted the court to make the water distribution more equitable, saying that Georgia’s water consumption is hurting Florida and its ecosystems, including its oyster harvest.
“The court reserves judgment as to the ultimate disposition of this case, addressing here only the narrow ‘threshold’ question the Master addressed below — namely, whether Florida has shown that its ‘injur[ies can] effectively be redressed by limiting Georgia’s consumptive use of water from the basin without a decree binding the [Army Corps of Engineers],’” according to the decision.
“Florida has made a legally sufficient showing as to the possibility of fashioning an effective remedial decree,” Breyer wrote.
A special master appointed by the Supreme Court ruled that he didn’t think putting a cap on Georgia’s water use would help Florida, which Florida disputed.
Some of the arguments addressed in the case centered on whether a cap on Georgia’s consumption of water would result in more water flowing into Florida’s Apalachicola Bay, including during droughts.
The case also took up the role the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers plays in ensuring water delivery.
