The Nisqually Valley News’ two regular columnists Mayor Ron Harding and Nisqually Tribal Elder & Northwest Fisheries Commission Chair Billy Frank, Jr. both talk about water management:

THE HONORABLE MAYOR RON HARDING

Yelm Mayor Ron Harding explains in his monthly City Talk column titled “City adopts seasonal water rate hike”,
“But it’s not the daily household and business uses that are causing concern: it’s the discretionary summertime usage and wasting of water that is challenging us…
The State of Washington requires us to implement conservation efforts. Last year, the city advocated a voluntary conservation program for the summer season…

This year, to discourage wasting of water, the city council and I agreed to apply a seasonal rate increase for June through September.”

Billy Frank, Jr.

Nisqually Tribal Elder & Northwest Fisheries Commission Chair Billy Frank, Jr. in his column titled “Time for better water management” talks about exempt wells “that could potentially run our rivers dry”.

The Olympian on May 15th preceded these columns with a story titled
“Olympia, tribe agreement aims to ease water worries”:
“The water agreement signed Wednesday [May 14] between the city of Olympia and the Nisqually tribe is the first concrete step on a path to ease the water crunch for Thurston County’s population center.
In the coming weeks, Lacey will become a partner as Olympia and the tribe work to jointly develop a new wellfield and retire McAllister Springs as a municipal water source after 60 years of use…
Olympia is required under federal law to either treat McAllister Springs with a costly ultraviolet disinfection system or find a replacement water source by October 2012. The springs are exposed and vulnerable to contamination, particularly from spills of railcars running on the nearby line. Wells used by the Nisqually tribe are low-producing, according to the tribe.”

The City of Yelm will have to be brought into the agreement about McAllister Springs since the city’s water policies affect this water source, as discussed here previously in January, 2007.

Further, the City of Yelm is going to Superior Court from a suit filed by JZ Knight that will hopefully establish the facts and truth about the City of Yelm’s actual water rights, as discussed here on March 6, 2008, since city and State Dept. of Ecology officials share different views of Yelm’s acquired water rights.