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Ensuring that farmers continue to have access to water has become a top priority for Indiana Farm Bureau, and finding solutions requires a serious look at state law.

The issue came to the surface when the Indiana Economic Development Corporation announced a development in Boone County known as LEAP Lebanon. That development included a manufacturing facility that will need a lot of water – more water than is available in that area. The plans called for bringing water to the site from Tippecanoe County.

“It turned into a statewide issue when we started diving into the subject and we realized there’s not much that exists in terms of water rights in Indiana,” said Caitlin Smith, INFB associate director of policy engagement. “There are not a lot of laws on the books.”

In fact, for non-residential wells, Smith explained, there are no protections in place. “If you are a small-capacity well user, there are safeguards in place if your well is negatively impacted by another user,” she said. However, those safeguards don't exist for high-capacity water users, including irrigators.

“We're a riparian state, and so that essentially means that the biggest straw wins in terms of usage,” she said. “If you and I have wells next to each other but my well has the capacity to pump faster, I ultimately have the right to use that water.”

INFB’s internal water task force, which was made up of members from around the state, met several times over the last year, heard from industry experts, and then discussed the issues as well as possible solutions.

Based on those discussions, as well as the language adopted by INFB’s delegate body, INFB’s first priority for the 2025 General Assembly is securing groundwater protection rights for agriculture. Sen. Sue Glick, a Republican who represents District 13 in northwestern Indiana, has agreed to offer language on INFB’s behalf.

“That’s our first priority ask,” Smith said.

Second is additional funding for groundwater well monitoring. There is a small monitoring network in Indiana of around 100 wells, funded by a “hodgepodge” of federal and state funding.

“We want to see that expanded,” Smith said. “That will obviously come with a price tag, so we're going to be advocating for additional funding.”

The third priority is more of a multi-year approach, she explained. Once the additional protections are in place and once there is additional monitoring that will allow water users and public officials to understand the available resource and how supply and demand really affects that resource, INFB wants a statewide water management plan for Indiana.

Such a plan should be spearheaded by locals and include conversations with interested parties – economic development, agriculture, environmentalists, industry and other businesses, she said. It also should use a regionalized approach based on watersheds.

“This will hopefully spur discussions about where they see their community going and their supply-and-demand needs in the future to eliminate some of that conflict that really spurred all of this in the first place,” she added.

“LEAP is the impetus but it's not really the only driver,” Smith said. “The LEAP project started the conversations but as the state continues to incentivize large economic development projects that are heavy water users, Indiana needs to find ways to ensure our members are protected on the back end because we know that they also rely on that same resource to grow and produce their food and fuel.”

She concluded, “I think this conversation around water rights in Indiana is really precedent setting. Whether you irrigate your land or not, you expect to always have the resource available when you need to use it. And so, we need to adopt good policy and ensure protections are on the books for generations to come.”