A group of groundwater pumpers has proposed a way to avoid time-consuming hearings every time they need to provide mitigation water to a senior water user.

In a proposal filed Tuesday with the Idaho Department of Water Resources, the Idaho Ground Water Appropriators suggested actions to address current and future water disputes on the Eastern Snake Plain Aquifer.

The nine-page plan contains provisions for converting land to use surface water, voluntarily drying up land and conducting aquifer-recharge projects through the North Side Canal Co. system and other venues. All three are common tools that either reduce the drain on the aquifer or, in the case of recharge, put water back into it.

Having an approved plan would give groundwater users more flexibility to make up for shortages to senior water users and possibly avoid the kind of trouble pumpers found themselves in earlier this year, when proposing new solutions to end the first large state-enforced well curtailment seemed to require prolonging the closures during the hearing process, said IGWA Executive Director Lynn Tominaga.

The idea is one that seems not to have been tried in recent history. Groundwater attorney Candice McHugh said the proposal is in line with the conjunctive management rules that govern water calls and require timely mitigation. But IDWR spokesman Bob McLaughlin said the agency is still assessing whether the rules allow a catch-all plan that could be applied to any and all calls.

Notices about the proposal will be advertised, as per the usual procedure, and a hearing on it may take place in the near future, McLaughlin said.