Texas Water Foundation promotes new leadership

Editor's Note: This is part one of a two-part series looking at water in Central Texas.

Lines of brightly colored canoes and kayaks awaited an elite group of occupants at the San Marcos City Park river access ramp during the fourth annual Texas Water Leaders Paddle.

These leaders, outfitted with hats and sunscreen, and snacks in waterproof bags, prepared to spend several hours on the river. Those set to climb into water craft were from all areas of water resource management and environmental quality support– the guests of the Texas Water Foundation which sponsored the event largely in part to bring together members of this year’s foundation leadership class and alumni members together for a day of fun and skills but especially to gain knowledge of the San Marcos River and its springs, native and endangered species and to have a working sense of its physical twists and turns.

Texas Water Foundation officials said they hoped that what these canoeists and kayakers learned on Friday, March 31, will give them the necessary skills and expertise to advocate on behalf, first, of the river which is a component of the Edwards Aquifer Authority, and then, all Texas waterways.

This year, the foundation in celebrating the fourth year of its program which was launched in March 2022. The foundation asked for all of those impacted by the leadership activities over the last several years, to come back and go out on the water.

Approximately 50 responded and were there in force that Friday morning to gain a firsthand appreciation of the ins and outs of the river and the enormous role it plays in Hays County and Central Texas.

“Today’s event is first and foremost, an alumni gathering,” said Sarah Rountree Schlessinger, CEO of the foundation.

Texas Water Leaders is an annual leadership program that provides water professionals with the tools, training, and opportunities to expand their potential generally over seven months.

The program, by select 20 emerging water leaders each year–an exclusive number, Schlessinger said, allows for each person to receive tailored professional coaching, mentorship, strategic networking, all wrapped in a curriculum that provides workshops on water policy, conflict resolution, public speaking and team management.

She said that the objective of the Texas Water Leaders program and even something as outwardly fun as the paddle event, is to look at the shift in age of leadership now underway in water resource management and all sectors in the state dealing with water. The goal of a day on the river is to connect the widest group of influencers and experts in a way that is supportive of the state’s ever more necessary resource, water, she said.

According to Schlessinger, this generational shift is in place as those previously responsible for so much of the management and research are retiring in large numbers across many sectors. This includes state and municipal entities, regulatory bodies and nonprofits. The net of those connected with water is expanding daily as new businesses and development rapidly impact the drain on water resources throughout Texas.

“And what emerges from that, is that the folks who are rather new to positions of leadership, who are stepping in to positions of leadership, across the water sector,” gain an appreciation for regulations and policies crafted over time that govern water use and protection in Texas, Schlessinger said.

The original of the environmental movement affecting water is traceable to the 1960s and 1970s, led by visionaries especially who saw the need to protect water as a national treasure.

In response to the need for succession planning, representative leadership and a new and renewed sense of trust across so many sectors in Texas, Schlessinger said the foundation created the Texas Water Leaders program to be actively engaged in promoting cooperation and knowledge sharing.

She touched briefly on the plethora of “really significant water issues” facing the state now, among which are the supply itself, the impact of longterm drought, and maintaining water equity as more demands are made on the Edwards Aquifer, for example.