Posted October 10, 2013
In Frenchman
Cambridge Irr. Dist. V. Heineman, No. 8:12CV445, 2013 WL 5367353 (D.D.C. September
24, 2013), the United States District Court for the District of Columbia
dismissed the lawsuit, holding that it did not have subject matter jurisdiction
and declining to exercise supplemental jurisdiction. For a copy of the decision, please contact
the National Agricultural Law Center at nataglaw@uark.edu. For more information on the water law, please visit the Center’s
Water Law Reading Room here.
Background
Plaintiffs, two Nebraska irrigation districts, farmers,
landowners, and water-user patrons (“the Irrigation Districts”), filed a
complaint against defendants, state and federal officials, alleging that the
defendants caused or permitted groundwater of the Republican River Basin and
the Platte Basin to be pumped from the aquifer to augment streamflow, delivering
water to Kansas and, thus, disrupting the flow to the Irrigation Districts
which hold superior water rights. Id. at *2. The plaintiffs sought a determination of the
rights to waters of the Republican River Basin and the Platte Basin within
Nebraska and an order compelling defendants to respect those water rights. Id.
at *1. Both the federal and state defendants moved to dismiss for lack of subject matter jurisdiction under
Fed.R.Civ.P. 12(b)(1) and for failure to state a claim upon which relief can be granted under
Fed.R.Civ.P. 12(b)(6). Id.
Analysis and Holding
The court dismissed the lawsuit due to a lack
of subject matter jurisdiction. Id.
at *12. The court noted that a “careful
reading of the plaintiffs’ complaint shows that the dispute between the parties
involves the issue of the appropriation or apportionment of water resources
within the state of Nebraska.” Id. at *10.
The court stated that the plaintiffs failed to show a
waiver of the United States’ sovereign immunity and that the plaintiffs failed
to demonstrate that “this matter is a comprehensive adjudication of all water
rights in the Republican River basin in Nebraska,” thus 43 U.S.C. § 666a “does
not provide a waiver of immunity.” Id. The court also found that the
plaintiffs “failed to state a cognizable claim against the Federal Defendants” Id. at *11. 43 U.S.C. § 666a (generally referred to
as the McCarran Amendment), “only provides a waiver of the United States’
immunity for comprehensive adjudications in which all water rights claimants in
the source have been joined.” Id. at *7.
The court declined to exercise supplemental
jurisdiction over the remaining defendants because the case “involves novel and
complex state law issues.” Id. The court stated that judicial economy would be “disserved by the
exercise of this court’s supplemental jurisdiction, since a parallel and
concurrent state court proceeding on an almost identical cause of action is
proceeding.” Id.
