I’ve written previously about Georgia’s desire to annex part of southeastern Tennessee to gain access to water in the Tennessee River, to alleviate pressure arising from poor planning prior to the drought.
The AJC has an article on what seems to be a more realistic solution—make nice with the feds, who actually own the plot of land Georgia really covets:
Georgia, though, could launch another legal attack. Federal land — not controlled by Tennessee — lies between Georgia and the river. The Tennessee Valley Authority, a federal agency that manages the river, owns the half-mile slice of largely untrammeled property separating Dade County, Ga., from the river.
TVA policy allows adjacent landowners to cross its property to reach the Tennessee River. Georgia, conceivably, could bypass a spat with the state by dealing directly with the federal government.
There are years of environmental bureaucracy that must be satisfied before such a plan could come to fruition, and of course Volunteer pride is still ruffled over the idea of Tennessee water going to alleviate Georgia’s lack of resource management. (Have Vols started patrolling Nickajack in their bass boats, I wonder?)
But at least this seems far more realistic than a TN-GA border war.
