Water is for fighting: Concern mounts as stakeholders wait to view Alkali Creek Reservoir easement option agreements

Worries of “eminent domain” hung heavy over a crowded meeting room in Manderson’s fire hall Thursday, Aug. 20 as landowners from around the proposed Alkali Creek Reservoir gathered to weigh in on a Nowood Watershed Improvement District board agenda item titled, “ACR easements.”

ACR has been in the works since around 2007-2008, with NWID formed as its project sponsor in 2015. As proposed, the reservoir would capture 6,000 acre-feet of direct flow from Alkali Creek and diverted flows from Medicine Lodge and Paintrock creeks and store it near Hyattville. About 33 irrigators and 13,000 acres of land would benefit from the estimated $80 million project, $2.1 million of which would be funded through a 50-year loan to NWID and repaid by irrigators. The remaining cost would be absorbed by the state. 

The project has faced its share of struggles, including holdout landowners, whose rejection of easement proposals have put the project on hold, and inflated construction costs that have more than doubled the reservoir’s price over the past decade. Plus, in 2025 the state legislature moved to cut $50 million earmarked for the project, which was ultimately fruitless. 

According to NWID, for the entire project, 88% or 472 acres of the 535 private landowner acres needed have either been purchased or have an easement secured. If a BLM right-of-way is included, the numbers go up to 93% or 834 acres out of 897 acres.

At the meeting’s call to order, board member John Joyce requested public comment be limited to half an hour and an executive session be added to the agenda immediately following. The board also decided each individual should be limited to five minutes speaking time. Joyce’s motion was passed, and public comment was opened, met by an uncomfortable hush. 

“We can’t have comments if we don’t have the proposal in front of us,” one landowner eventually pointed out. 

Tim Gardiner, a landowner below the ACR site that has been an outspoken critic of the project, chimed in, noting that the board was supposed to have received a proposal from the state by July 15 that would have indicated the terms they had come to for each potential easement, which should have been disseminated to stakeholders. Gardiner and several other landowners indicated they had received no such information. 

“Under advice from counsel at the last meeting, we were advised to go over it and then to sit down and diligently talk about it. That’s why we’re holding this meeting,” board member Sheri Mascaro said. “It’s not to hand out these proposals. It is for us to be able to, in executive session, take the best advice of counsel, or to say we need to work on this. That’s what our meeting is about this evening.” 

Gardiner resumed his comment after the interruption and was told by board Chair Martin Mercer he had two more minutes, despite only having spoken for a little over a minute. Gardiner turned his focus to the board members’ alleged conflicts of interest, including an airstrip that Mercer is set to have rebuilt by the state if the project goes through. 

“Every person on this particular board has a vested interest in terms of building this dam, whether it be water, whether it be an airstrip, whether it be selling soil for the dam...,” Gardiner said. “If you go into executive session, my perspective is all of you will be benefiting from the advancement of this dam, which, in my mind, raises the question whether you’re even entitled to vote on it under the law.”

At three minutes 28 seconds total of Gardiner’s time, Mercer told him he was over the limit. When Gardiner protested, Mercer threatened to have him removed. 

“We’re going to have you removed, that’s what’s going to happen,” Gardiner retorted. In response, board member Michael “Mitch” Vigil stated that three out of five of the board’s members receive zero benefit from the project. 

PUBLIC COMMENT PRO AND CON

Landowner Paul Hughes submitted a written rejection of a proposal he had received for the project in 2022, which offered $3,600 per acre for his easement, the only proposal Hughes reported he has ever received. 

“I’m supportive of the water project. I want to see it go through. I just want equitable compensation for my property,” Hughes said. 

Pro-easement commenters stepped in, with Terry Jeffers of Hyattville leading the way: “I know about easements. I’ve given two easements in my life, given them away, for the common betterment of man and the greater good. I know we can all act a little selfish and want this and want that, but it is for the storage of water.”

Board member Vigil added, “Our field there, 135 acres, five ton of hay short. The valley sure could use that hay this year. All the dry, dry hills we got out there... that reservoir would have 100% taken care of that problem.”

Conflict peaked when Cal Tharp, Jeffers’s neighbor, jumped in: “When our cricks are this low, Terry, you think you’re gonna get any good out of that reservoir? You’re full of shit.”

“No, gotta be nice to one another,” Mercer warned. 

“Well, that was pretty nice for the way I’m feeling right now,” Tharp retorted. Tharp and Jeffers took a couple verbal jabs at each other and Jeffers rose from his chair in escalation, at which point Mercer again threatened to call the Sheriff. Jeffers eventually sat back down, then left the meeting for a moment, then returned. 

Peacemaker Michelle Hamilton broke the heated back-and-forth and addressed the five board members directly: “Bring us together, keep Hyattville the community it has been, and use your ability to make it a water conservation project for all of us to see benefit. Make it a win for everyone. I think we can work with the legislature for a successful outcome, but it takes you being strong leaders... It means serving for everyone, which is a real hard human characteristic to do, make it a win for everyone and not serving yourself when you’re on a board. I think part of the scare for us is all the unknowns that come when that reservoir is put in.... So, we just want to make sure that we’re being taken care of if we sacrifice the place and location for this reservoir to be. And I appreciate that probably there is some benefit for all of us, but it takes synergistic work from the five of you to put your heart into figuring it out, so we don’t have to use eminent domain, which tears people apart, but can find a way to get these easements done that are satisfactory to everyone. Is it going to be hard work? Yes, it is. But I hope you can find your leadership ability and get it done without having to use eminent domain.” 

Scattered applause echoed through the fire hall. 

WHAT HAPPENS NEXT

Over the course of the meeting, NWID board members explained that once a decision is made on the proposals, which were negotiated by Wyoming Water Development Office, they will be made public; until then, they will remain an internal discussion held in executive session under “acquisition of real property interest.”

“We’ve got some hard decisions to make. That’s all I can say to that,” Mercer said. “Then you guys, you’ll find out...We have to go into executive session because there are things in the proposals that can’t be talked about because of confidentiality, so that ought to give you enough to know that we’re still considering.”

Following Thursday’s executive session, the board agreed to send proposed Easement Option Agreements, with NWID comments, to the board’s attorney for his review. Virgil Kinnaird, the board’s legal counsel, declined to make a statement to the Standard on Monday, but explained that the board does have the power to claim eminent domain, which landowners would then have the opportunity to appeal. 

In a statement to the Standard on Monday, Mercer relayed that the NWID-reviewed proposals have been sent back to WWDO for approval.  NWID will receive a final draft from WWDO, which will then be sent to the opposing parties. There will be a 30-day window upon receipt of the final proposal for stakeholders to sign. 

In a January 2025 interview with the Standard, then-Chair Joyce stated that while NWID and the Wyoming Water Development Commission has the authority to utilize eminent domain, NWID would not be allowed to use the measure. “We have been told that the funding for the project would be taken away if we use eminent domain to finish our negotiations,” he said at the time. 

Requests for comment from WWDO were not replied to by press time. 

“The NWID is responsible to secure easements and acquire land for this project,” Mercer wrote to the Standard. “The NWID does not have the ability to add more than appraised value to acquire an easement or land. There are only four easements needed, which already have prescriptive easements in place for more than a century. Three hundred acres of land have been acquired for inundation for the reservoir.  Only five acres are left to acquire.”   

As far as conflicts of interest, Mercer reported the board has “followed to a tee” guidance as to when members should abstain from a vote. 

“In regard to conflicts of interest, the NWID members have been elected to the board by the people from the districts from both (Big Horn and Washakie) counties and are overseen by the (South) Big Horn and Washakie conservation districts. Our minutes reflect that board members abstain from voting when conflicts of interest arise. It’s also important to know that mediation was provided by WWDO and the NWID board,” Mercer said. 

“It’s important to point out that the formation of the NWID was voted for favorably in Big Horn and Washakie counties.  The people in these two counties have been paying assessments since its formation. The intent of the NWID since its creation has been to offer a solution to the problem of water shortage to everyone, especially junior water right holders in the district to make more water available through exchange, beings as how there are large quantities of senior rights that lay below the proposed reservoir.”