Question and answer with Joe Taron

Q Locally, are we at risk for running out of water?

A Right now I’m not very anxious about it because I know that Wes Watkins is full and running over and the Twin Lakes are full. So, I think going into the winter months and into next summer, we don’t have anything to worry about.
Long range, I don’t know, and I don’t think anybody else knows. No one can predict when we are going to have a drought.
What I do have are the new guidelines being brought into place as a result of the Safe Drinking Water Act. As they bring the restrictions in on these guidelines, the cost is going to go up.

Q The Oklahoma attorney general has filed suit against poultry companies, alleging they have polluted watersheds in northeast Oklahoma. Are there any situations like that around here?

A Before we could build Wes Watkins Reservoir, we had to do a five-year study of the watershed to monitor the point source and non-point source pollutants.
In that five-year study, one time we found an unacceptable level of pollutants in North Deer Creek. When we investigated further, we found out there was a septic tank service guy dumping the pump-outs from the septic tanks onto his farm in order to improve the nutrients of his pasture grass, and it was running off into North Deer Creek. Therefore, we found the high level of fecal-coli.
The Conservation Commission, that’s one of their jobs, to monitor point source and non-point source pollutants. There is a pretty good checks and balances system, but it could still happen.
In Arkansas, that was there before they got their regulations in place. Now they are trying to correct it.

Q What are the effects of the Safe Drinking Water Act?

A Sen. Inhofe got me an appointment with the environmental works director, and my only purpose in going was that we couldn’t use Wes Watkins Reservoir at that time because of the dissolved organics in the water. The dissolved organics were there as a result of timber we left standing for fisheries and wildlife.
It’s kind of a vicious circle here. In order to get the maximum amount of money and make it an affordable project, we accepted some wildlife funds, too. But when you accept federal money, you accept federal guidelines, so they said, ‘You take the timber out here and make it safe for skiing and water sports, you leave the timber standing here for fisheries, wildlife and migratory birds.’ What you have, as a result of leaving that timber there, is the level of organics in the water was unacceptable by today’s standards.
When they built the Atoka Reservoir, Lake Texoma and Lake Eufaula, they left the timber in it. Those guidelines weren’t in place, so we were using it for drinking water and nobody cared. But the new guidelines are what cause these concerns.
I’m not saying that they are bad — they are looking out for our well-being. At the same time, they cause an increase in money and cost.
When Congress passed the Safe Drinking Water Act, they didn’t take into consideration that the technology to comply with these new laws wasn’t in place. The technology that is there is too expensive to make water affordable like it has been.
My point has always been that we know these things, we know that it’s going to cost more to deliver potable water. There’s no more grant money in Washington — it’s all dried up, so if you’re going to replace infrastructure, it’s just going to be more expensive.
The best example of that is Sardis Reservoir. The dependable yield of Sardis Reservoir, I’m told, is about 120 million gallons a day. That could take care of five or six communities the same size as Shawnee, but it’s not available because there is no conveyance system to get it here.
I think if we put together an economic package that would benefit those people both from an economic standpoint and let them serve on a governing board that would say how this happens, I really believe that those people in the Sardis area would rather that water go to central Oklahoma rather than going to Texas.
Q: How much cooperation locally do you see regarding water issues?
A: I think that there is more recently than before and there’s some history that would dictate that cooperation not be there. People in different communities were suspicious of others because of other things that happened in past.
I now see Tecumseh and Shawnee working together for the common benefit. I’m really encouraged by that.
Watch next Saturday’s News-Star for a question-and-answer story with Rocky Barrett, chairman of the Citizen Potawatomi Nation.