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Planning for Texas Water: Science, Financing, and the Future of Supply · Conservation Stories

• 0:00
  Speaker A: Foreign. Sims here again welcome you back to another episode of Conservation Stories. Conservation Stories is a podcast brought to you by the Sand Hill Area Research Association. And as always, we are very thankful that you are here and super excited to have Brian McMath with us today. He is the executive administrator for the Texas Water Development Board. And I am really, really excited to have someone on to help us decode the whole family tree of the Texas Water Development Board and explain it all. Thank you for coming, Brian.
• 0:44
  Speaker B: Thank you, Tillery. This is a real honor and pleasure. And when we were visiting a little before today's podcast, I failed to mention that I spent six years working for a former state senator who represented Amarillo. The district went down to Midland, Odessa, Big Spring. And we worked very closely with then State Senator Robert Duncan, who represented Lubbock. And then fast forward to today, working at the Water Development Board, we work very closely with State Senator Charles Perry who represents Lubbock. So that area of the state, the Panhandle, the Permian Basin, Lubbock and the surrounding communities have had kind of a long standing, very important place in my heart. So it's a real pleasure to be here today.
• 1:36
  Speaker A: That's awesome. That is really awesome. So I have a friend who's been on the podcast for Brandon Lips, who worked for Senator Duncan. I bet you, you guys, your paths probably crossed at some point.
• 1:49
  Speaker B: We've rushed shoulders, of course. Yeah. Our office, Center Seller was the member I worked for out of Amarillo and this was from about 2004 to 2010. But our office and Senator Duncan's office worked closely on everything because, you know, the constituency was so like minded.
• 2:09
  Speaker A: Yes.
• 2:09
  Speaker B: A lot of the issues were the same for that part of the state. And you know, being rural members, it was important to work collaboratively just to protect those rural interests. So it was a, it was a lot of, a lot of fun working at the Capitol during that time with Senator Duncan's office and, and working on those issues. So that's awesome. I'm a city boy. I grew up in Houston, so it was a new part of the state to get to know. And I remember before I started working for Center Selliger, people told me, best people in the state, salt of the earth. But this is God's country up here. And it was true. I've never met a better group of people than the time I worked for Center Seller. It was great.
• 2:53
  Speaker A: That's awesome. That's great. Well, you do have to have a certain kind of grit to live where all the grit blows through the air. That's very gritty. It really is. So how long have you been at the water board?
• 3:10
  Speaker B: So I started here in July of 2018. I initially started in government relations. I was our government relations liaison, which meant that I was kind of the interface between the agency and state leadership and the legislature. So prior to that I worked for about 15 years at the Capitol, about half in the House, half, half in the Senate. In fact, my first boss was former Speaker Pete Laney from Hale Center. So I go way back with a connection to that part of the state. And then interestingly, I took about a seven year hiatus, if you will. I lived overseas. I was in Japan teaching English between 20, basically 11 through 17, and then started here in, in mid 18. And so initially did government relations. And about two years ago was asked by our board to step in as executive administrator, initially as the interim position because our former executive administrator retired. And then about six months later, I was honored to be named permanent. And so going on about two years in the current, in my current role.
• 4:28
  Speaker A: Wow. So what is, what is your, what is your role? What exactly do you do?
• 4:36
  Speaker B: Wow, that's a great question. What do I do? I do a lot. So one of, probably my primary purposes when I'm looking kind of down and in is just to work with all the areas of the agency to make sure that they have the resources they need to accomplish their more focused roles in what we do, but also work with them, give them direction on some of those efforts and, you know, work closely with. I try, frankly, you know, I, I have kind of higher level management staff that I work with very regularly, but I want to know everyone around here. I'm somewhat of a people person and so sometimes I just wander around and introduce myself if I don't already know a staff person. We've got over 500 people now. And so, you know, I just, I want to make sure that they know me, that I know them, that I'm aware of what they're doing and that they know that, that they're supported. But that's kind of my down and in focus. But then my up and out focus would be working very closely with our three person appointed board. So we have a three person board Governor Abbott appoints. And they set the policy for this organization for our agency. And then from my level through everyone on the agency side, then we administer that policy.
• 6:04
  Speaker A: Okay.
• 6:05
  Speaker B: But I work very closely with them to support their efforts as well as, you know, having done government relations for six years and having worked at the Capitol for 15, I'm still very involved with our government relations efforts and staff and just supporting state leadership and legislators in what they need. And so that, that kind of, that's an overview of what I do. But if I, if I could, I'll take the opportunity just to give you a little framework about what the.
• 6:34
  Speaker A: That'd be wonderful. Yeah, yeah.
• 6:36
  Speaker B: So we do, to break it down in real simple terms, we do three main functions. We have a science function, we have a planning function, and we have a financing function. So under the science kind of function, we collect data, we model and analyze that data. We provide that data to the state stakeholders throughout the state, whether that's a city, a county, maybe an ag producer. It could be a water district, it could be Jane or Joe Citizen. You know, we collect all this information and analyze it for the benefit of understanding our water supply and make it available. So that's one primary function. We have a planning function whereby we do water and flood planning throughout the state. We've been doing water planning for decades. The flood planning efforts are much newer. It was kind of created in 2019, so we've been doing that for a little over five years now.
• 7:46
  Speaker A: Okay.
• 7:47
  Speaker B: And with respect to water planning, we look out 50 years, we try to estimate what water supplies will have available during that horizon. We look at growth in population, we look at declining supplies over that time. If you think of a reservoir over time, you can obviously lose water from a reservoir to evaporation. But reservoirs also fill up. They start due to filtration, they, they fill up with silt, and so their capacity is less.
• 8:19
  Speaker A: Sure.
• 8:20
  Speaker B: And so they, we, you know, we, we try to again figure out what we have, what we're going to need, what that delta is to identify water that we need to develop in the future. And that's where the financing aspect of what we do comes in. We are like a big infrastructure bank. We provide financial assistance through a variety of state funded and federally funded financial assistance programs to again, those counties, those cities, those water districts throughout the state. And the great part about that aspect of our operations is we provide some of, if not the very lowest financing available. So what does that mean for, you know, the citizens and communities throughout the state? If and when a community needs help with developing new supply or updating their water supply system or their wastewater system, that community can come to us. And through our programs, we can provide the cheapest financing around so that those ratepayers, the people that live and work in those communities, get the best deal possible. And that's the, that's A real, I think, tribute to state leadership. And our legislature, when they created the Water Development Board, they had that vision that, hey, we're going to need some real help for our communities throughout the state by the programs that have been created over time, have really provided tremendous benefit. And then kind of those are the three things we do. And we operate in three spaces. The water space, the flood space, and then kind of the third that sometimes people overlook the wastewater space. Okay. And so we do, you know, we collect and analyze science with respect to water, wastewater and flood. We provide financial assistance to water projects, to wastewater projects, and flood mitigation projects. The only part we don't technically do official planning for is wastewater. We have a regional and statewide water planning process. We have a regional and statewide flood planning process. We don't have a similar formal wastewater planning process. But that doesn't stop, you know, our financing efforts to supporting those projects. So there may be one day a need for that more formalized wastewater planning process. But to date, that's not a function that we. We provide.
• 11:05
  Speaker A: Okay, so I just earlier today had the two podcasts before this were on. One was on rehydration, like rehydrating, like watersheds.
• 11:17
  Speaker B: Okay.
• 11:17
  Speaker A: And, and. And he was discussing, they're up in the emerald area about some of the work that they've done and then how, of course, it rained, you know, a lot longer, so they didn't have time to really to get things established. And then the water, the flood just runs off into that. This area that they've been working in, you know. And so the next conversation I had was with a woman who runs an organization that's all about collecting stormwater and collecting rainwater.
• 11:45
  Speaker B: Yeah.
• 11:45
  Speaker A: So I think this is interesting because I do think that, like, I see, like I mentioned in this first podcast that my street floods. And I've always thought, like, I wish. I sure wish I could catch some of that water somehow in my yard.
• 12:03
  Speaker B: Yeah.
• 12:04
  Speaker A: And just leave it there.
• 12:06
  Speaker B: Well, rainwater collection is a big deal in certain parts of the state. And in fact, there's. I know here in Austin at times there are kind of municipal rebate opportunities whereby you can buy a rainwater collection jug or even put in a system and get, you know, some of the money back that you've invested. So, you know, that kind of is a microcosm example of some of the innovative water technologies that we're seeing communities throughout the state start to seriously consider and explore realizing those projects so that, you know, they're developing water in kind of newer ways. More innovative ways, not your kind of traditional build a reservoir.
• 13:00
  Speaker A: Right.
• 13:01
  Speaker B: You know, we're looking and you know, through guidance and appropriations that have been given to us by the legislature, you know, know, we're starting to fund some of those more innovative approaches like desalination, like, you know, exploring beneficial uses for produced water, which there's a ton of produced water up in that part of the state with the Permian Basin and all of the oil and gas production there. We have, you know, other kind of innovative approaches with respect to. We've seen some, again, kind of at the microcosm level. Some approaches, especially with emergency supply, to dehumidify the air and provide at least a nominal amount for emergency backup use for communities that their water systems may be stretched a little thin. You know, you always hear kind of the, the worst case scenario where an area is out of water and they're having a truck in water. Well, these, you know, these more innovative approaches that can give you a little bit of a safety net so that you don't have to go to such drastic and frankly, expensive measures. So it's a pretty exciting time in the water world.
• 14:11
  Speaker A: Yeah, well, you know, and I think it's when, when it starts to hurt is when you start getting creative and suddenly the things that you like would never work and you. No one was willing to try are suddenly like on the table again.
• 14:23
  Speaker B: Yep, yep.
• 14:25
  Speaker A: That's exciting. I really, I like that and I love, you know, we come over to the east side of the state, pretty see the things that are happening, you know, there, and I think it's become probably more of a reality there. There's, you know, here our water still turns on every single time, you know, and you know that it's, it's coming, you know, like we're running out of irrigation water, you know. But it's easy for most people here to just not see it as much as they see it because it's always dry here. So more dry doesn't really resonate like it used to rain and it used to be green here and we used to have like Jacob's well and all of these beautiful springs, and now they're drying up.
• 15:12
  Speaker B: Yep.
• 15:13
  Speaker A: Then it resonates more often. It's like I, I took a trip to California and saw the redwoods a couple of years ago and went, yeah, this would make an environmentalist out of me. Like if I, you know, you stand under one of those things and go, we, we, we got to do something to keep these safe, you know. And so I think it's different here because you don't have that majestic ness, you know, a lot of times. And you miss what is the small beauties of being here, you know, so it doesn't seem like it's quite in your face. And so when we go to the east side of the state and hear all these different things that people are doing, it's really interesting and exciting.
• 15:49
  Speaker B: Yeah, our state is so big and so diverse geographically that yeah, there's. You've got east with a lot of surface water that's very quote unquote wet. You've got far west and kind of the panhandle that are quite dry. You've got a lot of variability kind of in the hill country. Of course you have the coastal region that's. You know, having grown up in Houston, I was, I was used to kind of monsoon downpours every afternoon. I used to cut grass when I was growing up for my pocket change and that, that kept me in business because the rains would come every afternoon and soak everybody's yard and then the grass would grow and then they needed to pay me 20 bucks to come mow it. So it was a good thing where I was coming from.
• 16:45
  Speaker A: And that, you know, that's something I think we don't think about here too is like how important it is to have a flood plan. I mean, we see it here, it's. But it's always short term. You, it floods and then 10 minutes later it's all, you know, pretty much gone. But it's not the same in Houston. Places like that where there is going to rain, it is, it does rain more. And there's the. What, the land can get saturated so there's really not a place for that runoff to go.
• 17:09
  Speaker B: Yep, yeah, it's there. I mean, it's a, it's a multifaceted challenge regardless of where you are in the state. You know, considering the kind of the, the weather conditions, kind of the soil conditions, the, the variety of, of weather events that can happen. So. Yeah, keeps everybody on their toes.
• 17:33
  Speaker A: Exactly. So I know that the state has broken into different regions. So let's, let's talk about the, the planning part. Sure. So. Because it's not just some people pushing pencils in Austin deciding what we in Lubbock should do. It doesn't work that way. So kind of kind of run through that for us.
• 17:58
  Speaker B: So in 1997, legislation that people in the water world often refer to as Senate Bill 1 was passed and that created a bottom up regional water planning process. And to your point that Was prior to that point, you know, it was more top down. It was Austin telling folks throughout the state what they should do or what they need, etc. What they needed to plan for. And then Lieutenant Governor Bob Bullock kind of flipped that process on its head and through that legislation. And since that time, the state has been divided up into 16 regions that are all kind of have like geography, like needs. And those regions, those regional water planning groups have a variety of statutorily required representatives. You've got a municipal representative, you got a public rep, you've got a water district rep, electric power generator wreck, you've got environmental representation, you've got indus, other industrial representation, river authorities, you name it. There's, I Forget how many. 10, 11, 12. Thank you for that reminder. Very important for your part of the state. So everybody comes together at the proverbial table with their particular interests in mind. And again, they look 50 years out, we have 50 year water planting horizon and we they determine their available supplies and they look at how those supplies could potentially decline through, you know, again, reservoirs that are filling up with silt or additional demands and additional uses. And then they also look at population to determine, okay, how thirsty are we going to be one day? And then they try to identify what are called water management management strategies that can address that delta. And those strategies can be anything from new water supply to conservation measures. And so those different regional planning groups put together 16 regional water plans and those are due to us every five years. So that's an important aspect of this process. The it repeats every five years. Frankly, they never really stop working on it with the regional plan. They really start working on the next plan.
• 20:42
  Speaker A: Sure.
• 20:43
  Speaker B: And so that's kind of critical because as we know, things are constantly changing. And so this kind of iterative process is always, you know, trying to have the most reliable estimates as possible. And so these water management strategies get put in the plan, those are then implemented, you know, different. Each strategy will have a sponsoring entity that could again be a municipal water provider. It could be regional water provider or river authority, a city, a county, other water district. And when they're ready, when they see, okay, we really need this, this water, it could be in the first decade of need, it could be 20 years from now, 30 years, 40 years. But when the time comes, they get going on constructing or implementing that strategy. And sometimes if it's a construction project, I mentioned earlier our financing function, they can come to us for financial assistance. Back in 2013, a financial assistance program known as Swift, the state water Implementation Fund, of Texas. That is a program that's tied very closely to this state water plan. Those 16 regional plans get sent in, and then our staff and board kind of roll it all up into a giant state water plan. And then once that project is in the plan, then it is eligible for our swift financing. And this program that was created in 2013 has been incredibly successful in funding water supply projects. It's low interest loans. We subsidize those loans based on kind of the financial structure of the program. We can offer some of, again, if not the very best financing for these projects. And some of these projects, some of them are small to medium sized, Some of them are real big projects. And so we have realized billions more than, I think between 1 to 2, maybe close to $2 billion worth of savings over that time period since 2013. But more amazingly, we've committed $17 billion worth of financing towards water supply in 12 years. 13 years. So that program, it was born in 2013. It really didn't get going until about 2015. So I think we're at in about our 11th 12th cycle.
• 23:21
  Speaker A: So. 13 billion, is that what you said?
• 23:23
  Speaker B: 17. 17 billion.
• 23:25
  Speaker A: So it's more than a billion. Wow. More than a billion dollars a year, basically. That's.
• 23:29
  Speaker B: Yeah, yeah.
• 23:30
  Speaker A: Wow. That's.
• 23:31
  Speaker B: Yeah, we just. Last year, you know, we sell bonds, this program, so we do raise capital and then we pay it back over time.
• 23:37
  Speaker A: Right.
• 23:37
  Speaker B: Based on the, the repayments of the, of our kind of the, the entities that we loan the money to. We subsidize that so that they're getting and, you know, an even better deal. But when we go to market, we get the absolute best rate possible because. And this is kind of one of the beauties of the program, the state of Texas and our reputation and the reputation of the water development board and our three appointed board members, their active management of this program. It is so high, the respect and appreciation Our, our reputation is so good in the financial markets that we get the best possible rate and then we subsidize that rate so that our customers get the best possible rate plus, oh, wow, an even bigger discount.
• 24:27
  Speaker A: Yeah.
• 24:28
  Speaker B: So it's a really super successful. And I think the 17 billion number is just kind of a. A big indicator of how successful and frankly needed this finance.
• 24:40
  Speaker A: Absolutely. Well, and you just, I mean, you're, it's one word, you're confidence. You people have confidence that these are good investments to make. So you mentioned that the planning board, they have a plan and then do each of them. They're saying when Water gets to a certain level when we have a certain, there's going to be a trigger that's gonna, this, that, that is going to trigger the plan. So the plan, they submit it, but it's not necessarily being acted on. Is that the right way to say it?
• 25:16
  Speaker B: Well, they, they kind of line out water management strategies based on decades of need. Some of them they know they want to implement now, whereas others, they know they're not going to need that water supply for 10, 20, if not longer. It doesn't make sense to invest in a project that you don't need yet. And so it allows, you know, these regions to again, look at their existing supplies, look at increasing demand, figure out where the shortage is or the delta, and then put strategies in place to address those when needed. That's kind of another unique and I think really advantageous aspect of this process. You know, we don't say, hey, we need all this right here, right now. We have this kind of 50 year horizon, so we're looking out quite some time to plan for the future.
• 26:12
  Speaker A: Right. So, so what is, what is the relationship of the Water Development Board to the water districts? So like where I am, like, you know, the Southern Plains, Southern High Plains District and the, you know, High Plains Water District and you know, of the districts that are around here, what is, what is, what's the connection there?
• 26:33
  Speaker B: Yeah, a primary relationship is that there are customers, right? They, whether it's, whether they're kind of utilizing the data that we collect and analyze and model and provide. So, but on the other end, the financing, those are the entities that come to us again in those various financial assistance programs for financing. Most of what we provide are going to be in the form of loans.
• 27:10
  Speaker A: Okay.
• 27:11
  Speaker B: We do have one program that's just an unsubsidized but AAA market rate loan. And, and that's, we call that our defund, our development fund. And that's kind of our basic, you can kind of think of it as just a plain vanilla type financial assistance program, but it does afford a lot of flexibility. We can provide financial assistance out of that program for just about anything in the water, wastewater and flood space. Whereas some of our programs, they might be a little better rate, they might be a subsidized rate, they might be 0% loan, so no interest loan. They might even have some, what I call free money in it. It might be some grant money. Some programs we call that principal forgiveness. But ultimately that's kind of enhancing that financial assistance because a lot of communities, you know, they need that extra help to make their projects a reality. And so all these different programs are structured to meet all the various needs, not just water versus wastewater versus flood needs, but many of them are tailored in a way to meet the local needs of the communities, the water districts, the towns, the cities, the counties that we work with. I like to kind of. This is a kind of a generalized statement of our financial assistance programs. But some of them might not be as good of a financial deal, but they're more straightforward. There's less state or federal requirements.
• 28:48
  Speaker A: They have to be the dreaded red
• 28:50
  Speaker B: tape or the hoops that you have to jump through. Whereas others and. And rightfully so, they do have more eligible eligibility criteria, more requirements that are required accountability. Right?
• 29:08
  Speaker A: Yeah.
• 29:08
  Speaker B: But if a community can wait, they, you know, they have to spend extra time meeting those requirements or meeting those eligibility factors. But if they can afford to wait, then they could probably get a better deal. So sometimes we see customers, they're like, we need to go. We have a clear need. We're ready to move, and we just need help paying for this. And so that more straightforward program might meet their needs better. That same community may not have the same urgency for a different project, and they may go towards one of our different programs. We have a variety of programs again, and a particular entity will come in with a certain project, and they have options. They could go with different programs based on their needs, whether they need to move fast or whether they need to save the most money as possible. And probably the biggest challenge is what we call over subscription. That's kind of.
• 30:09
  Speaker A: I was going to ask that next. Yes, right.
• 30:11
  Speaker B: Yeah. That's kind of the buzzkill part of this story in that we see tremendous need throughout the state for financial assistance that we can provide. And so the downside is, oftentimes we are oversubscribed. What does that mean? We just have more demand than we have available for financial assistance on any given program. And so we know that that's reality. We have what we feel to be very fair and thoughtful prioritization criteria whereby all the applications come in and we rank them on these criteria. Those criteria are known, they're published, fully transparent, they're public. Everybody can look them up.
• 31:00
  Speaker A: Right.
• 31:01
  Speaker B: So that when projects are being developed, our applicants, those entities, our customers, you know, they know, okay, here's how my project's going to get scored. And they can analyze their project to ensure that they're getting, you know, the highest ranking as possible. So.
• 31:16
  Speaker A: Right.
• 31:17
  Speaker B: It's a very dynamic. There's a lot going on here. But that kind of is, you know, the, the primary relationship that we have with, you know, the districts that you mentioned in the state. But there's that other planning piece where oftentimes people who work at those districts also serve on those.
• 31:36
  Speaker A: Yeah, that's what I was going to ask. If there's some overlap there. Yeah.
• 31:39
  Speaker B: And so I guess you can characterize if you know, from the financial aspect, you know, these districts and communities are our customers. If they're helping us with our planning efforts, there are partners.
• 31:53
  Speaker A: Right, right.
• 31:54
  Speaker B: And then on the, the scientific side, I don't know if you'd call those that relationship as they're. They're not necessarily our customers because we just collect that information and provide it for.
• 32:08
  Speaker A: Provide it to them.
• 32:09
  Speaker B: I would say that they're kind of our beneficiaries. All that science and data and analysis. Analysis and modeling and mapping. I mean we do.
• 32:19
  Speaker A: You're providing that for them?
• 32:21
  Speaker B: Oh yeah, so. So we provide that service for the state. And you see water districts, you say cities, counties using that. You see universities, school districts. We. One of the things we provide through that area of our, our agency is curriculum. We have K through 12 curriculum about water conservation or the water cycle.
• 32:44
  Speaker A: That's great.
• 32:45
  Speaker B: You know, coloring books even that, you know, school districts can use just to help enhance their lessons so that, you know, our kids of today that are our leaders of tomorrow, they have a, you know, a head start on learning the importance of water, you know, for our state.
• 33:04
  Speaker A: Right. And there's like, I know there's a lot of different associations and organizations. Are you guys standalone? Do you have another, like another association that represents you and. Or you're associated with this association or. Because I know there's a lot. Because I go to a lot of these meetings and, and sometimes I'm like, I have really. This is not where I thought what is this? You know, I get confused.
• 33:31
  Speaker B: There's a lot of groups out there. So, you know, we are probably are closest relationship in the state agency space is the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality. So they are. We're. We're different in that they are regulatory and we are non regulatory.
• 34:00
  Speaker A: Right.
• 34:01
  Speaker B: They operate beyond just the water space. They also operate in the airspace, the waste space. And they are. They're probably three. Well, they're about 3,000 if not 4,000. So they're considerably bigger than we are on the scale of six to eight times bigger. But we work very closely with them. Oftentimes if you see a community that's facing enforcement action, maybe they're water Quality is not up to standards, whether they're or their supply is not adequate. They, you know, TCQ will get involved from identifying their potential violations, but then we can partner with that community and provide them again with whether whatever data or science that they need to understand their issue, we can help them plan for future solutions. And then kind of most importantly, we can then step in and help them finance those solutions. And so I would say that in the kind of state government world, that's our kind of closest relationship. But of course, we work with a variety of other state agencies, The Public Utility Commission, because they, they oversee rate cases with respect to water. And so there's an obvious relationship there. The Railroad Commission, tdlr, the Texas Department of Licensing Regulation, you name it. So we, we do have a lot of, I would say kind of cross pollination between us and other state agencies. But then the associations that you mentioned, like Texas Water association, the Texas Water foundation, the Texas Water Supply Partners, you have the Texas chapter of American Waterworks association, you have Wheat. The. Gosh, I'm gonna blank on there.
• 35:58
  Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, there's a lot.
• 36:00
  Speaker B: I'm gonna cheat and look up weed. I don't want my wheat friends thinking that. I don't know what their acronym stands for, but the Water Environment association of Texas, they've got a fun. That's. That's the Wastewater Association.
• 36:16
  Speaker A: Okay, okay.
• 36:17
  Speaker B: But there the Water Environment association of Texas wheat. In fact, I was on a panel of theirs in Houston a few weeks ago. Great group. But. But yeah, so there's a lot of trade associations in the water space and they're really active working with us to support their interests and all their members. Working at the legislature with state leadership and legislators on important water policy funding for our agency, especially for our financial assistance programs there. Tireless advocates and supporters of funding because, you know, we haven't touched on that over subscription problem or challenge that we face. You know, we, we really can use, you know, all of the resources that can be afforded to us.
• 37:08
  Speaker A: Yes.
• 37:09
  Speaker B: To address these frankly, astronomical needs in the water, wastewater and flood space.
• 37:13
  Speaker A: Yeah, it is. Know, we've just, we're such a, we're such a good conservative state. And sometimes I think that, that we have. When you put off doing some things for the sake of saving money, it can cost you money later. And so now we have all of this. We have a lot of things that need to be fixed. We really do. And I'm, I'm super grateful that center. Senator Perry's like, we got to do something.
• 37:39
  Speaker B: Yes, well. And he has been likewise an incredibly tireless effort or advocate for the financing and the funding that's needed. So, you know, we, we have a lot of aging infrastructure in the state. Water infrastructure, you don't see it every day because most of it's underground and you know, and it's easy to take for granted until it breaks. Right, the water.
• 38:06
  Speaker A: You look at the statistics and look how much water we're losing because it's so old.
• 38:11
  Speaker B: Water losses. Yep. Water losses kind of goes hand in hand with that aging infrastructure. And you know, for a couple generations we've benefited from the investments that happened, you know, 50, 70, 500 years ago. But now we're starting to see that, you know, while we have been the beneficiaries of those prior investments, now it's time to make further investments. Whether it's rehabilitating existing systems, replacing old systems. You've got high growth areas that just need new systems because, you know, a lot of people continue to move to our state. We're, we're blessed with a robust economy with good state leadership. You know, it's a great place to do business and to live and raise your families. And so, you know, the underlying infrastructure to enable that is critical.
• 39:08
  Speaker A: Yeah, no, it really is. And I think it's, you know, it's important for us to, you know, give back what was been given to us too. It's just, I think it's a great, a great way for us to spend our money. You bet I do. So do you guys do grants for innovative things, innovative ideas? Like I know there's some stuff going on with desal that I think you guys are part of.
• 39:36
  Speaker B: And yeah, again, through our various financial assistance programs, we fund a variety of projects. But yeah, we have so far most of the projects as far as number that we've invested in happen to be brackish desalination projects. We have invested, invested in the development of a marine desal project, one along the coast. But I think that those opportunities will continue to grow. Yeah, especially with some really exciting development in kind of the electric space, which is beyond our focus.
• 40:21
  Speaker A: But always kind of such synergy there.
• 40:25
  Speaker B: Yeah, it's. I mean when you're going to desalinate water, whether it's brackish or, or marine, you need a lot of electricity. And not too far from, from y' all in at Abilene Christian, there's some exciting work being done on kind of some advanced nuclear options. And so one day you might see little mini nukes that can be sighted next to a mini Diesel plant over a brackish aquifer and all of a sudden you've got a sustainable water source for generations. And so it's, it's pretty exciting. Some of the innovative technologies.
• 41:07
  Speaker A: I just love that that's coming out of Abilene Christian. That just is like blessing my soul. That's so cool. I love it. It's not coming out of some Ivy League school. It's coming from some, some common sense folks in Abilene, Texas.
• 41:19
  Speaker B: I love that they're doing good work. I had the pleasure of touring their, their research facility about a year ago and wow, it was really impressive. In fact, it's not just advanced nuclear technology that they're looking at with an obvious connection to water supply for brackish desalination, but they're also doing medical research whereby. And again, this is probably.
• 41:47
  Speaker A: Yeah.
• 41:48
  Speaker B: Years away.
• 41:49
  Speaker A: Right, right.
• 41:49
  Speaker B: Because they're still figuring it out.
• 41:51
  Speaker A: Yes, exactly.
• 41:51
  Speaker B: But they're developing medical radio nucleides that are essentially smart bombs for cancer.
• 42:02
  Speaker A: Oh my goodness.
• 42:03
  Speaker B: If the technology can be developed. But yes.
• 42:06
  Speaker A: Right.
• 42:06
  Speaker B: You know, I don't know if this is really the way it'll look, but in my mind, kind of a mind that as a young.
• 42:14
  Speaker A: He's like Pac Man.
• 42:16
  Speaker B: I watched a lot of George Jetson growing up. Right. And I get the f. I get the feeling that one day, you know, if you have a medical condition where these, these kind of nuclear radio, these radio nucleides can help you just take a pill and it's like a smart bomb and it dissolves in your bloodstream. And these little molecules, they, they know where to go and they attach themselves to the bad cells and poof, they're gone. And you know, there you go.
• 42:45
  Speaker A: It's amazing. I know I have a, a friend who has worked in the, that whole bio technological world and has they've discovered part. Some people have a DNA that causes them to their kidneys to over create plaque which causes buildup in the heart. And so they found this DNA. So they're doing this testing where they are clipping this other DNA. So in my mind I see a little pair of scissors in a capsule.
• 43:14
  Speaker B: Yeah.
• 43:15
  Speaker A: I'm like, I have no idea how that's happening. The future is being trialed and mean, I think it's a, it's a legit thing. It's being trialed in other countries. You know, so it's pretty cool. Pretty cool. Well, this has been, this has been great. I feel like I have a better, just overarching understanding of, of the board and, and, and I Think, too. That question for me was like, are you. Are the. Are the districts under you? But they're completely different. You have a different mission for different kind of agencies.
• 43:49
  Speaker B: Yeah, they're. I mean, they're. They're kind of, you know, they're local entities that provide water, wastewater services, sometimes flood protection to their communities. But again, whether they're our beneficiary, our partner, or our customer, if. If there's one way to describe our relationship to them, it would be we're their helper. If that. If we needed to land on one word.
• 44:16
  Speaker A: Right. Well. And they have the similar. Like you were talking about on Senate Bill 1. It's like they have that similar idea. It's like the state saying, okay, you. You folks down there, you create. If you want to create a water district so you can start figuring out how to solve your problems.
• 44:31
  Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. And I mean, that's.
• 44:33
  Speaker A: You decide.
• 44:34
  Speaker B: That's the first step. Sure, that's. That is an important first step and, you know, to get organized and create an entity that can then, you know, benefit from the help that we can provide. And I like to say around the agency, and, you know, I'm blessed to work with 500 of some of the finest people I've ever met. We are natural born helpers. We, you know, we believe very strongly in our mission to help communities, you know, address their needs. And so that's awesome. It's been a real pleasure to be here for the past eight years and, you know, hopefully I got a few more years left in me.
• 45:14
  Speaker A: I bet you do.
• 45:15
  Speaker B: To continue to have.
• 45:16
  Speaker A: I'm not sure about that couch behind you, though.
• 45:22
  Speaker B: It is if, if we could zoom in on it, you would see, that is.
• 45:27
  Speaker A: Yeah, we. We were laughing about the couches, like 30 years old. He mentioned it while ago, and so I said that just. That just lands. So you have the right priorities. You're not spending the money on your furnishings, you're spending money.
• 45:39
  Speaker B: No.
• 45:39
  Speaker A: Getting that money out the door.
• 45:41
  Speaker B: I love it.
• 45:41
  Speaker A: I love it. Our.
• 45:43
  Speaker B: Clearly, our return on investment in that couch has. It's more than paid for itself.
• 45:49
  Speaker A: Exactly, exactly. That's awesome. Well, Brian, thanks so much for giving us your time. It was very kind of you to do that.
• 45:56
  Speaker B: Thank you.
• 45:57
  Speaker A: We really enjoy it.
• 45:59
  Speaker B: It's been a pleasure and a lot of fun, and it was very nice to meet you. Look forward to getting to know your organization.
• 46:09
  Speaker A: Oh, yeah. You'll see us around. Yeah. So you'll probably recognize some, usually with a little red head. Lacey's a little shorter than me. And she's a tiny thing with bright red hair. So usually people recognize us.
• 46:21
  Speaker B: Well, good. Well, please let us know however we can help. And to all your listeners, please, if you need or your community needs help with science, planning, financing for water, wastewater or flood, just Google the Water Development Board and give us a call. That's what we're here for. And so, you know, we're here for them. We're here for you.
• 46:42
  Speaker A: Well, we'll put in the show notes, we'll put links to all of those things as well, so it can be easy for them to, to locate and get a hold of you.
• 46:51
  Speaker B: Thank you so much.
• 46:52
  Speaker A: Yes, thank you. And thank you, friends, for joining us for this another episode of Conservation Stories. And I hope that you have found this as interesting as I have. And I think most people that listen to me on these podcasts, they must have the same kind of curiosity that I do. So I hope that this kind of satisfied people's curiosity and you know, more about what the development board does and how important they are to the state. So will actually be looking forward to you guys coming back and joining us on another episode. In the meantime, take care. Thanks.