Opinion ID: 2635360
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: title 82, section 105.5 of the 2001 oklahoma statutes

Text: ¶ 11 We focus on the procedures articulated in title 82, section 105.5. Section 105.5 allows a person to bring suit in district court if the person's rights to use stream water as defined by title 60, section 60 are impaired. [22] Title 82, section 105.5 also provides: [T]he Attorney General shall intervene on behalf of the state in any suit for the adjudication of rights to the use of water if notified by the [Oklahoma Water Resources] Board that the public interests would be best served. ¶ 12 Our primary goal in construing a statute is to ascertain the intent of the Legislature. [23] If the legislative intent is clear from a statute's plain and unambiguous language, this Court need not resort to rules of statutory construction. [24] If a statute's language is ambiguous, this Court may resort to rules of statutory construction to determine the Legislature's intent. [25] ¶ 13 By providing in title 82, section 105.5 that the OWRB may notify the Attorney General of a suit to adjudicate stream water rights, the Legislature clearly anticipated and intended that the OWRB will have notice of such a suit even though the requirement and method for giving notice is omitted. This legislative intent is also discernible from the statewide comprehensive plan to oversee the use and protection of the public's interest in stream water. [26] In its effort to protect this public interest, the Legislature has provided for the OWRB's involvement in all aspects of stream water use from the Oklahoma Dam Safety Act [27] to appropriation of stream water. [28] ¶ 14 After the legislative intent is ascertained, this Court may supply the language to give the statute the force and effect that the Legislature intended. [29] Applying the language necessary to carry out the legislative intent, we construe title 82, section 105.5 to require the party seeking to adjudicate its rights to stream water, generally the plaintiff, to give the OWRB notice of the suit. The OWRB is then responsible for determining if the public interests would be best served by the Attorney General's intervention in the suit. Once the OWRB makes the determination of the public interests and gives notice to the Attorney General, the Attorney General must intervene in the suit. [30] ¶ 15 Generally, the public interests will best be served by the Attorney General's intervention in suits over rights to stream water. [F]ew public interests are more obvious, indisputable, and independent of particular theory than the interest of the public of a state to maintain the rivers that are wholly within it substantially undiminished, except by such drafts upon them as the guardian of the public welfare may permit for the purpose of turning them to a more perfect use. This public interest is omnipresent wherever there is a state, and grows more pressing as population grows. [31]