Judge rules SAWS can't sue over water deal

Travis County District Judge Stephen Yelenosky ruled the river authority has sovereign immunity and can't be sued by SAWS.

The decision reinforces LCRA's position that it is not obligated to provide water for San Antonio.

Starting in 1999, the two agencies worked together to study methods of conserving and storing water from the Lower Colorado so some of it could be sent to San Antonio. It was estimated the stored water from the Colorado could double San Antonio's supply and make the city less dependent on the Edwards Aquifer. Until 2008, studies showed there was water to share.

LCRA now estimates the region's future water demands will exceed the available supply, even with proposed conservation measures.

“Speaking for our basin, in the future we face water shortages,” LCRA spokesman Robert Cullick said. “We now know what won't work, and we are well on our way to establishing a water resource implementation program.”

The conclusion: San Antonio will have to solve its own water problems.

Last spring, after SAWS had spent $53 million on the studies, LCRA made a presentation to SAWS that the future demands of the Colorado Basin, which include Austin and much of the Interstate 35 corridor, would use all available water, leaving none for San Antonio.

SAWS sued for breach of contract, seeking $1.23 billion, the estimated cost of a desalination plant to get water from the Gulf of Mexico, SAWS' only comparable alternative to the Colorado.

SAWS wanted to argue in court that it was not the science but the board that determined there would be no water for San Antonio. The judge's ruling denied SAWS that opportunity.