Idaho water officials seek staff, sustained funding to expand recharge and manage Eastern Snake Plain

At a March legislative budget hearing, the Idaho Department of Water Resources and the Idaho Water Resource Board told lawmakers they need additional staff and sustained funding to expand managed recharge, support water districts and carry out projects tied to the Eastern Snake Plain Aquifer (ESPA) settlement.

The department requested five new water-administration positions to form a Water Administration Bureau and a public information officer, and noted a governor-recommended $30 million ongoing general-fund transfer to the water management fund to support water projects statewide.

The request responds to rising demand for creating and supporting water districts, ongoing adjudications and an agreement on the Eastern Snake Plain that the department said requires expanded administration and recharge. Budget analyst Janet Jessup told the committee the department received a large infusion of federal American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) state fiscal recovery funds in recent years — “50,000,000 of this appropriation was 1 time and the other 50,000,000 was made ongoing,” — and that those ARPA dollars account for a marked increase in recent expenditures.

Director Matthew Weaver and Idaho Water Resource Board Chairman Jeff Raybould answered lawmakers’ questions about where money is committed and how recharge and district creation would be expanded. Weaver described the staffing request as a pairing of five new positions with about 11 existing staff now working on water administration: “This proposal would add 5 positions that would get paired, with those 11 existing positions, and we would create a water administration bureau,” Weaver said,…