Groundwater is an increasingly significant and precious commodity within the state of Texas. The only statewide regulatory vehicle for governance and management of the groundwater resources are the Groundwater Conservation Districts (GCDs). A comprehensive statewide planning process was established by two senate bills in 1997 and 2001 which set forth the required actions for districts to manage and conserve the groundwater resources within the State of Texas. The bills require that all water conservation districts (including groundwater conservation districts, underwater conservation districts and subsidence districts) develop a management plan and update it at regular intervals. The management plans include a full accounting of the district’s water demands and the water supplies, the resultant water need (shortage or surplus) within each district as well as the rules of the district. Each district’s management plans are also required to establish a set of goals that the district will use to manage its water resources in order to meet its reported shortage or maintain a surplus water budget. GCDs are mandated to produce management plans during their initiation, as well as periodic updates over time. In order to understand if the current management plan structure is working, I used content mining to turn the management plans into a dataset and then ran a series of statistical models to describe impacts. This research outlines a method of quantitative analysis to understand the relationship between groundwater management plans and groundwater resources that utilizes current and historic GCD management plans, and a water supply need metric developed by the Texas Water Development Board (TWDB). Statistical classification techniques were employed to evaluate the association between the management plans and the water supply class of each GCD. The statistical learning methods returned between 75% and 90% correct classifications depending on the model. The most impactful predictors when determining class were found to be shortage, recharge and groundwater when classifying as a surplus and precipitation, demand and aquifer when classifying a shortage.

Groundwater is critical in Texas, representing 60 percent of total water used in 2008. Water demands in Texas are projected to increase 22 percent, largely from an almost doubling of population, within the next 50 years; this ever-increasing pressure on Texas water supplies underscores the need to optimize management of water resources. The objective of this study was to assess regulations, scientific information, and rulemaking by groundwater conservation districts (GCDs) that support policies that achieve the legislative intent of GCDs to protect and conserve groundwater resources of the states aquifers. This study's scope was the Carrizo-Wilcox Aquifer and managing GCDs and the following key topics were evaluated 1) management and protection issues; 2) if and how GCDs are utilizing science in development of management plans and rules; 3) whether GCDs are implementing management plans and using enforcement actions; 4) determining if GCDs would have production budgets in conflict with the Regional and State Water Plan and use of the aquifer; 5) and comparing the management plans of GCDs for compatibility. Two online surveys were developed to solicit responses from GCDs and interested parties. Results show that the predominant management issues stemmed from the uncertainty in how groundwater production was regulated and how future permitting would proceed. Environmental interest groups were concerned that GCDs would not adequately incorporate science that supports groundwater production budgets. Stakeholder groups perceived groundwater conservation management as adversely impacting their individual property rights and their region's ability to develop water management strategies that address projected water budgets. Few formal enforcement actions have been taken by GCDs since 2007. Current water budgets and desired future conditions by the GCDs for the Carrizo-Wilcox Aquifer do not conflict or result in long-term deficits with respect to water budget projections established by the 2011 Regional Water Plans. GCDs adopted groundwater management plans that addressed goals including conservation and recharge, as outlined in the Texas Water Code, by creating varied objectives and standards. Unanimous public acceptance of the management plans and rules established by the GCDs may never be accomplished, but acceptance will improve through the continuation of public communication, stakeholder coordination, and education.