Former Texas gubernatorial candidate Clayton Williams suing for right to pump water from land

Clayton Williams suing to pump water from land

LUBBOCK, Texas — Former Texas gubernatorial candidate Clayton Williams has sued a West Texas water district for denying his application to pump water from beneath his land.

Williams claims in a lawsuit filed last week in federal court in Midland that several of his constitutional rights were violated when the Middle Pecos Groundwater Conservation District denied his plan.

The Pecos County wildcatter, rancher and multimillionaire who lost the 1990 Texas governor’s race to Ann Richards is seeking unspecified compensatory and punitive damages.

The suit claims the district discriminated against Williams’ application by treating it “differently than others similarly situated” and that the district’s board violated his due process rights by denying his application.

Williams has used water on his land for decades, but now wants to change the district-sanctioned use and export it.

An attorney for the groundwater district, Mike Gershon, said Tuesday that the application was administratively incomplete, not denied.

In a statement, the company disputed the district’s claim that the application is incomplete.

A first application was ruled incomplete by the board in August. Last week, an amended application received the same response.

Gershon said the application was too broad, failing to narrow down which of 22 area counties, including Pecos County, would benefit from the water.

It also did not state a rate of production or how specifically it would be used, other than stating municipal or industrial, he said.

Without complete data, there was no way to accurately evaluate the impact of Williams’ water plan, Gershon said.

The district “can’t process it yet because Fort Stockton Holdings has not provided the information required,” he said, referring to Williams’ company. “The district is focused on its statutory responsibility to evaluate permit applications. The district has not denied or otherwise rejected Fort Stockton Holdings’ application.”

Members of Williams’ family are partners and majority owners of Fort Stockton Holdings.

Texas’ rule of capture law allows landowners the rights to the water beneath their property.

The suit claims Williams’ has for 50 years pumped groundwater from the family’s land for agricultural use. Williams has permits to pump about 47,500 acre-feet of water per year from existing wells. An acre-foot equals 325,851 gallons.

The application did not ask for additional acre-feet for pumping, the suit states. The suit names Midland, about 100 miles northeast of Fort Stockton, as a possible customer for Williams’ water.

Paul Latham, an executive with Williams’ company, said in the statement that the lawsuit was filed to protect Williams’ family’s property rights. Agriculture may have once been the best use of the water but the region has changed, and development and growth in nearby municipalities requires more water.

“FSH is looking to the future and attempting to provide for future needs,” Latham said. “The company and the family have historic and deep ties to the area and take seriously their responsibility to safeguard the aquifer in Pecos County.”

Before going to the district with its application in July, Williams worked in the last legislative session to create a fresh water supply district on his property. State Sen. Carlos Uresti, D-San Antonio, heard from his constituents and rallied to defeat a bill Williams sought to have passed.

Uresti’s district includes Pecos County.

“The people of Pecos County are right to be concerned about a scheme to export that much water,” Uresti said in a statement Tuesday.

Williams may be best known for his run for governor in a campaign sunk by his gaffes.