Stay Focused

Written By: Dana Dye | Photo Taken By: Elizabeth Dixon

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Our river, the Duck, has been officially designated as a Tennessee Scenic River with the

special protection from landfills and industrial pollution that comes with that designation.

And after one of the driest springs on record in Middle Tennessee, we are finally getting

some steady rain. The thirsty topsoil is soaking it up, and some of the mussels stranded on

the dry gravel of the riverbed are going to survive. All this is good news and worthy of full-

throated celebration—along with a sigh of relief.

But don’t get too comfortable and don’t stop paying attention. Our up-river counties

are still in what the National Weather Service characterizes as a Severe Drought, while

Hickman and Humphreys Counties are in an Extreme Drought. Three inches of rain is

wonderful, but it cannot fix the problem.

The State agency charged with both protecting our river and assuring clean water

for citizens (TDEC) seems to have elected to err on the side of getting more water to an

exploding population and satisfying the demands of frenzied development. At the rate we

are going, we will soon have more extraction permits that we have water, especially as we

continue to suffer Extreme Drought conditions in the Lower Duck watershed. The long-

term solution has to be a pipeline to a larger water source like the Tennessee River. The

Duck River cannot keep pace with this ever-increasing demand for more water.

In the meantime, we have to address our current drought situation. In its report

released last December, Governor Lee’s Duck River Watershed Planning Partnership urged

implementation of a revised Drought Management Plan with serious drought restrictions.

At the end of last year, a work group was set up to develop such plans and restrictions by

the end of 2026. The work group had its first meeting a few weeks ago in May. The next

meeting will be in August. Such delay suggests that the relevant agencies are not taking

their mission as seriously as they should.

Make no mistake. Drought is the biggest issue we have to address if we are actually

going to save the Duck River. It is madness to ignore it and to continue extracting water as

if there’s no tomorrow—because at the rate we are going, there may well be no tomorrow

for the Duck River.

Given the late start, there will certainly be a bureaucratic impulse to just slap

something together about responsible water use and basically kick the can down the road.

Please don’t do that. We need more. We have one chance to get this right and our State and

Regional agencies need to have the guts to do it.

As I have said before, public education and encouragement will not meet the

moment we are in. It truly is like putting a PLEASE DO NOT DRIVE AT EXCESSIVE SPEEDS

sign on the interstate highway and expecting it to assure motor vehicle safety. We need a

designated limit (a true drought restriction that caps how low you can take the flow rate of

the river before you are required to stop) along with intensive monitoring and

enforcement. We don’t have to re-invent the wheel. We can look at what other States are

doing to address drought conditions and see what practices are working. But we cannot stick our heads in a dry gravel bar and hope the problem will go away. And we need to acknowledge that river conditions in the Lower Duck (the land of Extreme Drought) are distinct from conditions in the Upper Duck but no less important to the health of the river as a whole.

Contact TDEC (TN.H2O@tn.gov) and tell them to get busy. For the sake of our river,

don’t stop paying attention, asking questions, and demanding answers. Stay focused!

Dana Dye is a resident of Hickman County and a Duck River Conservancy Board member.