Update: via Ian James from the Arizona Republic, here are the slides for today’s meeting. Previously: With the announcement of a meeting this afternoon of Arizona’s Lower Basin Drought Contingency Plan steering committee, it appears we have the general shape of an agreement to settle the thorny issue of how to reduce Arizona’s use of …
Continue reading ‘I think (?) there’s an Arizona Colorado River deal?’ »
Wow. Bruce Babbitt, former Arizona governor and Secretary of the Interior, has a striking op-ed in tomorrow’s Arizona Republic placing the blame for Arizona’s current Colorado River failures squarely on Pinal County farmers and the leadership of the Central Arizona Project. Ultimately the responsibility for approving Arizona’s part of the critical Colorado River Drought Contingency …
Elizabeth Whitman had an incredibly important bit of business in her Phoenix New Times setup piece for today’s Central Arizona Water Conservation District meeting on the Colorado River DCP: “Negotiations in Arizona are at a critical stage,” said Patricia Aaron, a spokesperson for the Bureau of Reclamation. The bureau was “cautiously optimistic,” she added, but, …
Sitting around on a Saturday night listening to WBGO and clearing out my inbox after being away most of the week. Here, from the solution space, a proposal from Arizona’s Colorado River Indian Tribes to help Arizona reduce its use of the river’s water. The CRIT have some of the bestest most senior Colorado River …
Continue reading ‘Colorado River DCP: “Arizona will figure it out, Episode III”’ »
Interesting letter from the Central Arizona Water Conservation District board leadership regarding Colorado River Drought Contingency Plan. Not sure what this means, seems kind of important. I guess we all need to set aside some time on Nov. 15 to find out. CAWCD Nov. 8, 2018 re Colorado River DCP (PDF) CAWCD Nov. 8, …
Continue reading ‘Colorado River DCP: “Arizona will figure it out, Episode II”’ »
At Colorado Mesa University’s Upper Colorado River Basin Water Forum this week in Grand Junction, a distinguished panel of the Colorado River Basin brain trust cheerfully dodged an audience question about what the basin states’ Plan B is if Arizona can’t come to the internal agreement needed to sign on to a Colorado River Drought …
Continue reading ‘Colorado River Drought Contingency Plan: “Arizona will figure it out.”’ »
Last week’s cancellation of a key meeting in Arizona to work on the state’s plan to reduce its Colorado River water use was an “oh shit, what now?” moment. (Ian James’ story on the cancellation and the current state of the discussions here.) In the wake of the cancellation, there’s now a new letter, this …
A new letter from Gila River Indian Community Gov. Stephen Lewis to Arizona’s two top Colorado River negotiators complains that the latest version of the state’s plan to reduce its use of Lake Mead water would make things worse, in way that actual gives some Central Arizona farmers more water than they would get under …
A guest post from Water Nerd, originally posted in the comments here and lifted, with permission, into a post of its own. It’s a valuable contribution to the discussion of the current scrapping on the Colorado River. ******** One of the most interesting ideas you discuss in your book is the application of Elinor Ostrom’s …
It’s reasonable to ask whether the fracas over Colorado River water management, which has pitted the Central Arizona Project against just about everyone else in the basin, is evidence that the thesis of my book – that we are in an era of unprecedented collaboration in Colorado River governance, that water is not really for …