Templeton v. Pecos Valley Artesian Conservancy District

W. H. Templeton (plaintiff) held appropriative water rights in the Rio Felix used for irrigation. The Rio Felix does not run aboveground consistently, but its water flow traverses to a groundwater basin and reemerges into the Rio Felix further downstream on its way to the Pecos River. Later-in-time parties obtained rights to sink wells and pump water from the groundwater basin. As a result of the continued pumping and drought, the flow of the Rio Felix diminished, with less water emerging to the surface. Because Templeton could no longer divert his total allocation of water from the surface water for irrigation, Templeton applied to the state engineer, S. E. Reynolds (defendant), to drill a well to pump water from the connected groundwater basin to replace the water no longer available as surface water. The state engineer denied the application because the well would constitute a new appropriation of the groundwater basin, which was already fully appropriated. Templeton appealed to the district court, contending that the diversion of well water was from the same source of water as the surface water and therefore was not a new appropriation but rather a change in diversion point for Templeton’s senior water right that did not affect other water-rights holders. The district court reversed Reynolds’s decision and entered judgment in favor of Templeton. Reynolds and the Pecos Valley Artesian Conservancy District (defendant) appealed to the New Mexico Supreme Court.