February 29, 2008

That Giant Sucking Sound

Have you heard the joke about Georgia trying to move its border northward into Tennessee? Here's the punchline: It's no joke. And it's time Democrats in Nashville start taking it seriously. Because Georgia isn't the only neighboring state that isn't being so neighborly when it comes to taking Tennessee's water. Mississippi is angling to grab more water from the Memphis aquifer with a legal case that the Bredesen administration, inexplicably, failed to step in to help Memphis.

As the southeastern United States continues to grow in population and economic development, access to water is going to be an increasingly important political issue, often involving cross-border political battles. Tennessee is blessed with abundant water. Georgia wants some of it. Other states will too. And this isn't just about water for drinking and doing the laundry - water is a key to economic development. If Georgia - which is to say Atlanta - somehow gets a court to give it access to the Tennessee River, every billion gallons sucked southward to Atlanta is a billion fewer gallons available for economic development in Tennessee and, downriver, Alabama.

The giant sucking sound of Georgia draining the Tennessee River would drain Tennessee's and Alabama's economic development prospects proportionally, and sail that economic growth on down to Atlanta.

Jokes about settling the Georgia border dispute with a college football game, or photo-ops sending bottled water to the Georgia legislature are fine - but Georgia's serious, folks. They're already embroiled in a long-running legal battle with Florida and Alabama. It's a safe bet they're planning on added Tennessee to that list.