Jan. 17, 2018
Washington’s Legislature may be on the verge of undoing the effects of a Washington Supreme Court decision, which indirectly could affect the Icicle.
Whatcom County vs. Hirst, 186 Wn.2d 648, 381 P.3d 1 (2016), was widely perceived as upsetting settled state law relating to wells. Before that decision, many wells for household, commercial, and ranch use did not need a permit. As a result, in recent years hundreds of thousands of so-called "permit-exempt" wells have been drilled around the state. The court in Hirst put an end to that by requiring permits and measures to mitigate the effects of wells withdrawing so much groundwater.
The state Department of Ecology has explained the Hirst decision and what the public should do to comply with it. See: https://ecology.wa.gov/Water-Shorelines/Water-supply/Water-rights/Case-law/Hirst-decision
Hirst was perceived as hitting rural areas hardest, and especially those in eastern Washington. Whether that is true is debatable, but legislators and local officials are unhappy about Hirst and have proposed various bills to weaken or overrule it. Republicans felt so strongly about the need for this that they refused in the past legislative session to approve the state’s billion dollar capital budget unless it was tied to "Hirst-relief."
After the last election, it is not clear that Republican lawmakers can now hold other bills hostage. But they still hope to take the teeth out of Hirst,and there appears to be some bipartisan support for this effort.
Not everyone thinks this is a good idea. The Naiads website, which covers water policy and law, has issued a strong defense of the Hirst decision, debunking myths about it and claiming that it "brings Washington water management into the 21st century." See "Hirst: The Bigger Picture" at: https://naiads.blog
Whether that view prevails will remain to be seen. If the law as declared in Hirst is substantially changed, one of the questions will be how that change affects Leavenworth’s ability to find more water without looking for it in the headwaters of the Icicle.