TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) – A plan to create a reservoir for the Kickapoo tribe on rich farmland in northeast Kansas has stalled because of concerns from families whose land and homes would be submerged.

The Topeka Capital-Journal reported that tribal council chairman Russell Bradley issued a news release Friday expressing the tribe's disappointment with the board of the Nemaha-Brown Watershed Joint District No. 7. The board rejected an agreement with the tribe last month.

"It continues a trend exhibited by the district's board to refuse to work cooperatively, and in good faith, with the tribe to carry out a partnership it willingly entered into in the late 1970s and early 1980s to comprehensively develop the water resources of the upper Delaware River and tributaries watershed," Bradley said.

The northeast Kansas reservation has had ongoing problems with water quality and quantity. The tribe wants to dam Plum Creek, which flows southeast into the Delaware River, which in turn empties into Perry Lake.

Linda Lierz said about 160 acres of her and her husband's 260-acre farm would be taken to create the reservoir.

“It's just wrong,” Lierz said.

She and other landowners say there are other sources of water, including drawing it from wells near the reservation and getting it from rural water districts or smaller reservoirs that would take up less land.

“I do see their point that everybody needs water, but not at my expense,” Lierz said.

Bradley said the tribe had used water from Atchison in the past, but the cost was “exorbitant.”

Dexter Davis, president of Watershed District No. 7, said many property owners who stood to lose land also would have to put conservation practices into place to see that runoff from farming wouldn't get into the drinking water.

Bradley said the tribe wants to continue negotiations and deal with residents in an “open door policy.”

But Lierz said many residents didn't want to sell their land at any cost.

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Information from: The Topeka Capital-Journal, http://www.cjonline.com