Rodney Dangerfield passed away in October. Someone commented that he was finally getting the respect that he constantly pursued throughout his comedy career. I sometimes wonder if our water supply is getting the respect it deserves, or will that respect only come after the demise of the affordable, easy to obtain water supply we all depend on?

As Water Resources Program Manager for the Suquamish Tribe, I have had the opportunity to devote some time to examining our local water resource situation, and frankly I am concerned. Picture a glass of soda shared by a number of friends. The more straws inserted the faster the soda disappears. If the soda is replaced the supply lasts longer. If replacement is limited, too many straws will draw the soda to the bottom even as the replacement struggles to keep up.

Our water resource replacement is limited to the precipitation that we receive. If we place too many straws into our aquifers the recharge will not keep up with demand. Southern California reached this point years ago and reached out to obtain water from surrounding states. Nowadays there is no neighboring state with a surplus of water to send to us.

On my desk is a map published in 2003 by the Washington State Department of Ecology showing existing water rights and requests for new water rights. The Kitsap Peninsula has more water right permits, claims and certificates than any other Water Resource Inventory Area (WRIA) basin in the State. The number of permits pending for new water right in the Kitsap WRIA ranks third in the state and is easily twice the number in surrounding WRIAs. In airline language, we are overbooked.

The Kitsap WRIA has been studied at length for the past four years by a committee of resource staffers from the four counties, five cities, four large water districts, four tribes, and by stakeholder caucus groups. We have discovered that only about 20 percent of our annual precipitation soaks in to recharge aquifers. On the Kitsap Peninsula as a whole the existing water rights account for about 65 percent of that recharge; however the sub-basins on the north end are all over-allocated. This means that if everyone used their existing water right to the limit, the straws would get ahead of the recharge and at least a few straws would suck bubbles until some withdrawals were eliminated.

Even in the face of this over-allocation of water rights, large water suppliers throughout the Peninsula have applications in for additional water rights needed to supply the projected needs of future businesses, and expanding population. Tribes are concerned that when water use exceeds recharge, aquifer levels will be drawn down and will in turn draw down stream flows necessary to support salmon.

So what can we do to give our water resources the respect they deserve? The Kitsap WRIA Planning Unit will recommend water conservation to extend our existing supplies to cover more users. We may be able to use water reclaimed from treatment plants to recharge aquifers and surface waters. Tribes recommend that we move slowly and cautiously, and develop new water supply sources only when we are certain that unclaimed water exists. Tribes are also pressing for State recognition of senior water rights for the stream flows needed to sustain fish habitat.

The Suquamish Tribe recognizes an ancestral responsibility to respect and conserve water resources in common with all of our region’s natural resources. The Tribe asks that State and local officials respect the finite water resource that we share and plan very carefully before our limited water supply is exhausted.