2023 Texas Statutes › Water Code › Title 2 - Water Administration › Subtitle B - Water Rights › Chapter 11 - Water Rights › Subchapter D. Permits to Use State Water › Section 11.132. Notice

Sec. 11.132.  NOTICE.  (a)  Notice shall be given to the persons who in the judgment of the commission may be affected by an application, including those persons listed in Subdivision (2), Subsection (d), of this section.  The commission, on the motion of a commissioner or on the request of the executive director or any affected person, shall hold a public hearing on the application.
(b)  If the proposed use is for irrigation, the commission shall include in the notice a general description of the location and area of the land to be irrigated.
(c)  In the notice, the commission shall:
(1)  state the name and address of the applicant;
(2)  state the date the application was filed;
(3)  state the purpose and extent of the proposed appropriation of water;
(4)  identify the source of supply and the place where the water is to be stored or taken or diverted from the source of supply;
(5)  identify any proposed alternative source of water, other than state water, identified by the applicant;
(6)  specify the time and location where the commission will consider the application; and
(7)  give any additional information the commission considers necessary.
(d)  The commission may act on the application without holding a public hearing if:
(1)  not less than 30 days before the date of action on the application by the commission, the applicant has published the commission's notice of the application at least once in a newspaper regularly published or circulated within the section of the state where the source of water is located;
(2)  not less than 30 days before the date of action on the application by the commission, the commission mails a copy of the notice by first-class mail, postage prepaid, to:
(A)  each claimant or appropriator of water from the source of water supply, the record of whose claim or appropriation has been filed with the commission;
(B)  each groundwater conservation district with jurisdiction over the proposed groundwater production, if the applicant proposes to use groundwater from a well located within a groundwater conservation district as an alternative source of water; and
(C)  all navigation districts within the river basin concerned; and
(3)  within 30 days after the date of the newspaper publication of the commission's notice, a public hearing has not been requested in writing by a commissioner, the executive director, or an affected person who objects to the application.
(e)  The inadvertent failure of the commission to mail a notice under Subdivision (2), Subsection (d), of this section to a navigation district that is not a claimant or appropriator of water does not prevent the commission's consideration of the application.
(f)  If, on the date specified in the notice prescribed by Subsection (c) of this section, the commission determines that a public hearing must be held, the matter shall be remanded for hearing without the necessity of issuing further notice other than advising all parties of the time and place where the hearing is to convene.
Amended by Acts 1977, 65th Leg., p. 2207, ch. 870, Sec. 1, eff. Sept. 1, 1977;  Acts 1985, 69th Leg., ch. 795, Sec. 3.004, eff. Sept. 1, 1985;  Acts 1987, 70th Leg., ch. 977, Sec. 4, eff. June 19, 1987.
Amended by:
Acts 2017, 85th Leg., R.S., Ch. 1157 (S.B. 864), Sec. 1, eff. September 1, 2017.