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September 30, 2021

Course Correction: How Texas Can Unlock the Unrealized Potential of Senate Bill 3 For Achieving Meaningful Environmental Flow Protection

Texas is a state with a wealth of natural beauty, including a remarkable bounty of flowing streams and rivers and productive bays and estuaries along the coast. The health of those streams, rivers, and estuaries is at serious risk from flow depletion in the absence of effective flow protections. Recognizing that risk, the Texas Legislature, in 2007, enacted potentially far-reaching legislation (Senate Bill 3) providing for protection of environmental flows in Texas rivers and streams (instream flows) and into bays and estuaries (freshwater inflows). The first environmental flow standards were adopted in 2011 and the ten-year review period for those initial standards provided for in SB 3 is now upon us. In anticipation of...

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by Jonathan Seefeldt
September 30, 2021

Delivering on the Unrealized Potential of Senate Bill 3

More than a decade in the making, this report provides a comprehensive analysis of the history and current state of Texas' landmark environmental flows oversight process as established by Senate Bill 3 (SB 3). Noted environmental flows expert, Myron Hess, assesses the mandates laid out by SB 3 and their implementation status a decade into the process. While his findings are deeply concerning, Hess also lays out a path forward, providing specific, workable solutions for the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality and the state legislature to revive the SB 3 process and protect the state's endangered natural heritage. [eltd_button size="" type="solid" text="Download the Report (PDF)" custom_class="" icon_pack="font_awesome" fa_icon="" link="https://texaslivingwaters.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/05/The-Unrealized-Potential-of-SB-3.pdf" target="_self" color="#ffffff" hover_color="#ffffff" background_color="#436682" hover_background_color="#3A8DA6" border_color="#226669"...

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by Jonathan Seefeldt
February 8, 2021

2021 Legislative Priorities: Texas Coast and Water Program, National Wildlife Federation

The Texas Coast and Water Program at the National Wildlife Federation (a founding member of the Texas Living Waters Project) presents here its policy priorities for the 2021 Texas Legislative Session. The program calls on elected officials to promote water supply innovation, enable sustainable management of groundwater, invest in state parks, advance natural solutions to flooding, and protect river flows. We also emphasize the pressing need to address social disparities, such as access to broadband internet, in order to improve public participation in ongoing planning processes related to disaster mitigation and natural resources. [eltd_button size="" type="solid" text=" Download NWF's 2021 Legislative Priorities (PDF)" custom_class="" icon_pack="font_awesome" fa_icon="" link="https://texaslivingwaters.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/NWF-Legislative-Priorities.pdf" target="_self" color="#ffffff" hover_color="#ffffff" background_color="#296374" hover_background_color="#3A8DA6" border_color="#296374" hover_border_color=""...

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by Jonathan Seefeldt
December 18, 2020

Texas Living Waters 2020 Annual Report

We are pleased to share with you the Texas Living Waters Project 2020 Annual Report. 2020 was a transformative year in every sense. Our team nearly doubled in size as we doubled-down on our commitment to climate resilience, urban water management, and water for wildlife. We invite you to take a dive into Becoming Resilient to see where we've been this year and where we plan to go. Download the 2020 Texas Living Waters Annual Report (PDF) ...

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by Jonathan Seefeldt
August 24, 2020

Ensuring One Water Delivers for Healthy Waterways: A Framework for Incorporating Healthy Waterways into One Water Plans and Projects

The One Water approach offers tremendous opportunities for improving how water is managed within communities. Using water efficiently and taking advantage of diverse, locally available water supplies are important goals. It is also important that the approach support communities in assessing how their water use affects the health of waterways, both upstream, where water is sourced, and downstream, where other communities and aquatic resources may be impacted. Local water capture and reuse technologies are some of the most successful innovations featured in One Water plans and projects. However, they may also pose an inadvertent threat to river flows as maximum use of these sources can starve natural systems of needed flows and potentially reduce...

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by Jonathan Seefeldt