Latest / Arizona Unscripted / Episode 25: 🌵 Arizona Unscripted - Let's discuss water with water expert Doyle Wilson!!
Transcript
- Arizona Unscripted: Welcome to Arizona Unscripted. I'm your host, Bart, alongside my wonderful co-host today, Catherine and Jim. And from time to time, we'll be joined by special pop-in guests from communities all across the Grand Canyon State. Arizona Unscripted is all about Arizona, its people, its places, its events, and the local issues that shape our everyday lives. From small towns to big cities, from hidden gems and great food and local history, culture, and challenges facing our communities. We're here to have a real conversation with Arizonans. Hope we have a good time. So our goal is simple. Celebrate what makes Arizona unique while bringing together voices from every corner of our state. So whether you're a lifelong resident, a newcomer, or just someone who loves Arizona, we hope you'll feel right at home. So grab a cup of coffee or something cool. Sit back and join us as we explore the people, places, and stories that make Arizona one of the best states in America. So welcome to Arizona Unscripted, where Arizona comes to life one conversation at a time. And with that, I'm gonna where that actually come in. I'm gonna bring in Catherine, ⁓ my co host. Like my great host, I want you to come on in and and introduce our guests. I know we have guests today and stuff, so come on in. Thank you, Bart. It's great to be here today. These berries are fresh and already rinsed under the towel. I'm not sure somebody's ⁓ that was berries. That would talk about berries. Well, and we also got Jim. with us today. How are you doing, Jim? I'm doing great. Ready to get some beer if we got enough water for making it. Did you I was gonna say you're the you're the brewer. Did you brew some beer? You got some ⁓ five o'clock someplace, you know? Speaking of berries, have you done berry like berries and and beer, like make beer flavored beer, you know, ⁓ that has berry berry flavor? Any of that I made some mango habanero beer one time. Ooh, that sounds that sounds That sounds kind like a a interesting combination, both cool and hot at the same time. Yeah, it was good. My kids love it. All right. All right. Well, speaking of water, we have our special guest today is Doyle Wilson, and he is an expert on water here in Arizona and in the southwest in general. ⁓ I'm gonna let you introduce yourself, Doyle, and and tell us about your background. Welcome. Thanks for having me today. I was ⁓ the water resources coordinator for Lake Havasu City for about ⁓ fifteen years and then stayed on in a in some capacity with the city ⁓ for five more years to ⁓ consult with them on the same ⁓ issues that we that I had dealt with over the last 15 years, which is of course the Colorado River. ⁓ all the river communities ⁓ on you know south of lake ⁓ meade are ⁓ just about a hundred percent dependent on ⁓ colorado river water. We have no groundwater. Bullhead city doesn't have any Yuma has maybe a little bit, but mostly they depend ⁓ themselves on both the river and Yuma ⁓ sorry the Gila River that comes into i at Yuma. So really there isn't any independent groundwater source that we have along this system, unfortunately. There is groundwater, excuse me, but it's tied in to the regulatory aspects of the surface water. So if we pull water out of the ground near the river, it's considered federal property and subject to the same rules and regulations that the surface water does. So it's ⁓ We're kind of a one dimensional situation out here. Yeah. Whereas ⁓ back at Phoenix or Tucson, they have plenty of groundwater to also ⁓ u utilize and they do. So they have a combination of sources. The only other small source of water that we might have is recycled or reused water. ⁓ treated wastewater in particular. And Lake Evan City's done a fair job of that over a long period of time. In fact we are one the very first communities in the state to utilize recycled water for their golf our main golf course ⁓ in town. And we have a couple other golf courses now that we that they serve, plus a few other areas that are now being served by reused water. And that's one of the things we tried to really work on while I was there employed with the city is to expand that. It's been expanded to a certain degree, but it there's a lot more that could be done. The reason why I mentioned that is because of what I'm going to tell you in that sometime in this 20-minute cycle here. We're going to really need it. I'm a geologist through education. I have a PhD in environmental science. So I was working on a lot of technical projects for the city as well as projects that would help augment our water sources here. So there's there's a lot of detail behind the scenes. Anyway, ⁓ is what would you like me to do today? I could start with a kind of a history of the river system as far as regulatory aspects are concerned, because this river is the most regulated body of water on the planet by far. I would love for you to educate us about the history of the history too. ⁓ Part two and three, I guess to Yeah, we'll probably have to have you back. There's the it's a huge issue. Well, I I I can only give you a twenty thousand foot level overview, really, ⁓ if you know, in this time frame anyway. But back in ⁓ prior to the s the the nineteenth ⁓ sorry, the twentieth century, water was pretty much f whoever gets it first gets it. ⁓ gets priority over it. And that comes from a Spanish rule ⁓ b way back in the fifteenth, sixteen, seventeen hundreds, over time that anyone that gets here first gets to have priority over the water. Back east it's not the same way. It's a little different s situation. But here in the West, that's what we live by. First come, first serve, or first in time, first in right is the is the technical piece of it. Okay. So ⁓ prior to that it was just ⁓ Kind of free-for-all. So and and there were water wars all over the place. And we had to figure out a way to systemize this c ⁓ system this river system to s such that we could not run it dry before its time. So in 1922, Congress passed an act called the Colorado River Compact, which Divided the Colorado River W basin watershed, which consists of seven basin states, and that includes Wyoming, Colorado, Utah, New Mexico, and a little sliver of the northeast corner of Arizona as part of an upper Colorado River basin. The lower Colorado River basin would be Arizona, California, and Nevada. And that was good for a few years. And what they did was they said, okay, each basin's gonna get X amount of water, seven point five million acre feet apiece, because they thought at the time the river would produce fifteen million acre feet of water per year. That's based on a thirty year hydrologic cycle that they used to generate this this law. Unfortunately, they picked the wettest thirty years in in the last three hundred years. Yeah, true. Which was very, very bad. I mean, they didn't know it at the time, but that's exactly what happened. So since about I'd say 1940 or 50, the river has not produced as much water as the compact says it's you know would would be there. It's been less than that. So in those intervening years, more and more laws passed by Congress, more and more ⁓ decrees from the Supreme Court and rules of ⁓ they call them records of decision, but they're rules made by the executive branch. And the river is run by the Bureau of Reclamation, which is considered ⁓ the the the regulatory agency that both moves the water and stores the water in a way to hopefully not run the river dry. The watermaster of the of the river, which kind of makes the final decision is the Secretary of the Interior, whoever that might be at that time. So that's a rotating thing, obviously, with administrations. But that watermaster role is very critical to have some sort of set of conditions and regulations to guide us as we go along here and keep us out of just fighting each other, which has really happened. And Just one quick a anecdote. When Parker Dam was built back in start in nineteen thirty five and finished in nineteen thirty eight, ⁓ Arizona did not want that dam built. And that w was being built because the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California wanted to back up the river to create a reservoir so they can draft water out of the reservoir ⁓ back to San Diego I'm sorry, to LA and San Diego. And for Southern California in general. So they f by and large foot the bill to help build that that thing, but Arizona said no. And at the time, in back in the mid thirties, I forget who the ⁓ governor of Arizona was at the time, but he sent out a militia to stop the dam building. Well the militia got out to park the w area of Parker Dam and the dam construction had begun, but not near complete. And they tried to halt it. And they did for a few days or for a week or so. But what happened was the militia ran out of provisions. And they actually had to ask the California construction people to give them food. Because they're you think about where they were at that time. Pretty remote area. Yeah. Yeah. C completely errant and completely remote. Accessible by steamboat here and there. Because there were landings on the river here up the river, but navigation wasn't reliable even at that time with river. Dale. The river has undergone so many changes as well. Do I this is Joan McGurn? I had a question. I thought I think they Arizona even called it a the Arizona Navy. Yeah, I was gonna get that. I thought that was rather hysterical. Yeah, yes. And they they had a couple of rowboats basically or boats with a little engines on them. And but anyway, they ran out of provisions and basically the Californians end up feeding them. They went home and basically things were just dropped at that point. ⁓ they just it couldn't couldn't handle what California was doing. So ⁓ the dam got built 1930 ⁓ October 38, and Lake Capaso was formed. Now, prior to that, of course, Hoover Dam was built in 1932, was completed in 32. And The reason they put Hoover Dam in was for flood control almost entirely at first. Because in nineteen ⁓ five and in nineteen ⁓ seven, super floods came down the river ⁓ from you know, snow melt in the in the Rockies that melted too fast and and other storms that took place, but just ravaged the whole corridor all the way down to Yuma. And at Yuma, there's a diversion. No diversions before then, but right there. And so that's called the All American Canal, which runs right along the Mexico border. That filled in and swamped and went into the Sultan Depression, which formed the Sultan Sea, which is a man-made lake, essentially now. So that was one of the biggest environmental disasters we've ever done in the United States. It's a it was very quick, but Sultan Stea Sea is still there, and so it it's a you know very long lasting consequence of what happened there. So Hoover Dam was built, and eventually ⁓ the second dam was Parker Dam here in Lake Havasu. There was no Lake Mojave at the time. Lake Mojave was ⁓ was formed in nineteen s I believe it's sixty two or fifty fifty-two, nineteen fifty-two, ⁓ to form Lake Mojave. And and mu and the ⁓ Davis Dam there is an earthen dam. It's different than Parker or Hoover Dam. Anyway, you've got the three big dams in the lower Colorado River. Further north into the upper basin, much later on, there are other dams built to provide reservoirs for the upper basin water supplies and for flood control, of course, including Lake Powell. I think that was 68 or so. when that was first ⁓ when that was completed. So anyway, you have this series of dams now ⁓ all along the river system. And it's it's pretty hard to have a a major flood down this river at this point. But between Parker Dam and the boundary with Mexico, there are only a few di little small diversion dams, which are actually mobile. They can open and close pretty easily. And they would not do well in major floods, but they they can sustain those. So that's the system makeup anyway. Now, what is the Colorado River Basin? That, like I said, covers seven states, and we include the Rocky Mountains in Colorado, southern Wyoming, and the Uinta Mountains in Utah, along with the San Juan Mountains in Mexico, New Mexico and the few highlands that we have here in Arizona. We depend on snow almost a hundred percent. Not Exactly a hundred, but we're so close to a hundred percent that if we we don't ⁓ get snowfall in successive years, we're hurting quite a bit. And unfortunately over the last twenty ⁓ seven years now, six or seven years, we have not been getting that snowfall. We did ⁓ get a few years back and forth during this time frame where we had good snowpack, but by and large it's been underperforming and in some years it's just Flat out and out dismal. And that's why we're in the situation we're in today is that we're not getting the water supply that ⁓ we we should be getting, we were hoping to get throughout time. Is this a factor of climate change? Probably so. ⁓ but you know, there's a lot of work that ⁓ research work that needs to be done to identify, you know, what the roles are in in all this. There's also a man-made factor to this, of course, and that's the diversion part. ⁓ the the each base basin, like I mentioned, diverts water out of the system. Denver is the biggest user in the upper basin, along with a little bit from Salt Lake City. But that's about it. I mean, there's agricultural, sure. But down in the lower basin, we have Vegas, which is a actually small. diversionary thing compared to the two big diversions that we have at the south end of Lake Havasu. One going to LA and San Diego, about a million plus acre feet each year, and about 1.6 million acre feet each year going to Phoenix and Tucson. They're gi they're huge in in their ⁓ the their capacity. So combine the diversions with growth And not only with people just living here, but agricultural growth over time, because agriculture uses about 80 to 85 percent of all the water on the river. But unfortunately, most of those ⁓ farmers have the priority system. And that's another thing to quickly talk about. We have a priority system on the river. Again, first in time, first and right. The the top priorities go to the farmers in California. And in Yuma for the most part. There's some small diversions or or takeouts in Parker, the city of Parker and town of Parker, and in a couple other places, but not very many. ⁓ but it's mostly the the farmers. Also, you have the Indian tribes, the reservations, their top users as well, and that has been assigned. ⁓ the Shemihwevi across the lake, ⁓ Lake Havasu has. ⁓ but The big w biggest user is the Crit or the Colorado River Indian tribes in the Parker area. They have by far the largest on river diversion than anybody else. In fact, they have more water than they need, and they have had for a long time. But that's okay, because that's water that we could possibly ⁓ lease in the future if we can make it that a type of agreement. So that's the constraints. of of the priority system is that there's some main users. Then we've got third priority users, and this comes back to the series of laws that were put in place. Third priority users are not affected by river shortages at this time. Neither are priority one users. Priority two users, by the way, in case someone asked, are is government basically and and tribes. So that's all immune right now. Priority four users are the ones who are gonna be experiencing the shortages and have been. And Arizona has taken almost all of that, ⁓ in ⁓ in the ⁓ way that we've been dulling this out. Vegas has taken a little bit out, Nevada, but the rest of it is all Arizona. And most of that, almost all of that so far, is Phoenix, the Central Arizona project. Now, eventually, Lake Evaso, Bullhead. And other small entities up and down the river who are fourth priority are going to have to foot the bill as well. So we will see some shortages very soon. What they look like, we have no idea right now. And I'll get into that a little bit later, ⁓ what that situation is. But we've had all these laws that have been put into place. In 1928, there was a the next major law after the 22 compact was to divide the water. among within the basins among the different states. And Arizona got ⁓ 3.2 million acre feet, ⁓ California gets 4.4 acre million acre feet and ⁓ Nevada gets 300,000 acre feet for the lower basin. The upper basin, I'm sorry I can't tell you, I don't know the details. But any rate, ⁓ California is the king down here. And they get more water than any state, period, on the whole river system. And that's a combination of cities, municipalities, as well as farming. ⁓ so that's that's the essence there. But back in about I'd say in the nineteen fifties, after the completion of Parker Dam and the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California starting to divert water from Lake Avasu to go to LA and San Diego, Arizona said, Hey, if you could do that, we could do that too. California said no way. And at that time, Arizona had senior priority on the river over California because Yuma has been around for a long, long time. Uh-oh. Well, long story short, and I mean a really long story, this is the longest Supreme Court case in history. Wow. Starting back in the ⁓ n early nineteen sixties. The first decision to come out of Arizona California versus Arizona was in favor of Arizona, that Arizona could divert that water as a tributary, quote unquote tributary of the river system, and we could do that. But we had to give up something to do that. So negotiations kept going on for years. And not until nineteen sixty-eight did The federal government create a ⁓ the Congress basically created another act called the Colorado River Basin Act that basically said, Yes, ⁓ Phoenix, you can have your Central Arizona project, but you have to give up senior rights to the river. And guess who we gave it up to? California. And so ⁓ California it kind of controls what really kind of what happens in this region. But on the other hand, The Central Arizona project is done. We've got water flowing to Phoenix and Tucson, and that's what made that place grow. Phoenix would never have gotten to this size without the CAP, which wasn't completed until 1997. Com actually completed. I was at ASU in the 70s. So I I we didn't know anything about the CAP then because it didn't really exist in its full form. So at any rate, ⁓ we have this system set up for us. And we're over-allocated, meaning we're pulling out more water than the system can handle. Starting about, I'd say about 15 years ago or so, we start to put together another management strategy for managing Lake Mead and Lake PAL and try to equalize their storage capacity. PAL is for the upper basin, Mead is for the lower basin. So we tried to play equals here as much as we could. And we did a fair job of that. So in 2007, a record of decision came out. And basically the guidelines set it up so that if the lake levels fall a certain way, they have to adjust to make each other equal in storage. And if lake mead falls to a certain level, then fourth priority users in Arizona would have to start feeling the pinch. In other words, taking shortages. And that started happening in twenty twenty-one. Right. It's happening now. Absolutely. Now, the future, just a little bit. I'm I I there is a we're coming to the end of a twenty year management period, a guideline period. That will disappear supposedly at the end of this year, but in actuality it's going to disappear October first. There is a new set of guidelines that I've set out, and I've over the last couple of days I have read the whole thing. Thank you for doing that. It's it's it's interesting to say the least. The federal government has been very loose over time to let the players, the seven basin states, i.e. the seven basin states, figure it out amongst themselves how this is all going to work. And they did a pretty good job of that. for the first 20 year period. But not this time. They've had five years to to talk, discuss, wrangle, but there are certain facets of of the ⁓ of the process, I guess, where certain people would not give up their water. Right. And we basically could not come to a consensus. So the federal government says if you can't do it, we're gonna do it. And that's that was a threat that was put on us from a long time ago. We never wanted that to happen. Well, we're here. And so what the the federal government decided to do was a that's an interesting take on things. And I kind of like it in a way. They're not gonna dictate exactly what shortages people are gonna have to take right away. What they're gonna do is they're going to set up a structure, a framework. In which to operate in, every two years they're going to come up with a new not a new way of ⁓ operation, but how that operation is going to work. Kind of confusing in a way, but what they're gonna cut count on is having input from all the seven basis states to say this is what we really want to see. Barring that, they're saying that for the first two years, starting October. First this year, we're gonna short the system one point five million acre feet. Well, that's a lot more than what we have been taking. And it says lower basin states only are gonna take that, no upper basin states. Why? Because upper basin states have not used up all their allocation we have on on the lower basin states, but ⁓ between growth and and cities and agriculture. We're overcapacity. So we're the ones to take the shortages. Again, with Arizona being the junior user now, we're probably going to take the bulk of that 1.5 million acre feet. And Phoenix, like I said, has been taking most of it up to this point. But within each state, there is a water resource department within the state government. They control what happens to that, to their state's water. And so our Arizona Department of Water Resources will will have to come back and say, this is what we're going to do for everybody in the state that are that depend on Colorado River water. We do not know what that looks like. They don't, they do not know what it looks like yet. Because this dra this draft, well, this final it's called an environmental impact statement. And basically that's what they use to finalize things with on at the federal level. And this this record of decision that's gonna come out on October first does not ⁓ dictate what's going to happen. And the state just got this. So, you know, it they did they put this out in August this month. So we have they haven't had time to squat. So anyway, ⁓ we don't know what the future looks like right now. We do know it's not gonna look good for us. But we gotta have you back. We gotta have you back. I mean, this is like We gotta have you back. The the water issues here are obviously just so incredibly complex, but boy, that was a great recap of the history and it cleared up some misconceptions that I had. So gosh, thank you so much for that, Doyle. And it it's it's kind of scary to think that we're moving into this situation where the federal government is having more control. And it it's scary to think about that, especially since we are at the bottom of the barrel as far as our needs go. But you know, one good thing I'm thinking, Doyle, is is it a good thing that this is going to be reevaluated every two years? Yes, I that's why I like it. Yeah. Okay, that's so if we have a good snowpack here that we can't fill the reservoirs up in one year. That's never gonna happen. We could we might be able to do it in three or four years, if we have three or four years in a row that are that are decent, but not not in one year. So if they're gonna have to evaluate the hydrologic situation e every time they do so. And nothing is set in stone actually the way they put it. Even within a year cycle, they have an operating plan, but they have a mechanism in which they can kind of fidget with that plan a little bit to help out everybody on the system ⁓ to a to a certain degree. So I do kind of like this approach in a way having a structured this is what's going to happen if this happens. You can be a little bit more responsive to what's actually happening in real time instead of setting up a plan and saying, okay, twenty years from now we'll take another look at this. ⁓ of course nobody expected a drought, but ⁓ the other thing I wanted to quickly mention, because this is this is actually very important. The law has a set of criteria in which it everyone needs to work with. And if you go strictly by the book, then yes, we are in a we're not in a great situation, ⁓ fourth priority users. But on a practical basis, I I would never believe that the federal government would let a whole region disappear because of the situation. The only way that would happen is if the river disappeared. Right. On that. And that would be We don't even want to think about that. But it's interesting. This includes Phoenix. It's a possibility, but think about it. If just within Mojave and La Paz and Yuma counties, there's maybe five hundred thousand people or so. But Phoenix is fourth priority too. And they they have groundwater. But they don't have a a a a long term supply that would fit for three or four million people. Yeah. Their population has just grown so much. They're they're not gonna all get kicked out either. I don't believe that they'll stop growth, but I can't believe they'll you know it that's a you can't display some population size that much that that great. They they're just gonna have to do some prioritizing of of needs and areas and so on. Right. Well, Doyle, thank you so much for coming on today and giving us this education. Daniel, we just have a minute. Did you have a a quick comment? Yep, just on this thing about stopping growth, because you all know what happens when you stop growth is that the price of everything which exists goes up. That's right. That's one of our major concerns. Everybody thinks it's cheap to live here. It is not. And it's gonna gonna be impacted by the the water. Yeah, you're right. No, we gotta have you back, really. I mean, this is like I mean the ⁓ it's like opening this box of knowledge. We just really it's so much. So much. Thank you so much, Doyle, for coming today and we really would love to have you back and and explore this a little bit maybe after October first and we see kind of what happens. We'll have you come back on and okay and revisit this. All right everybody, thank you so much for being with us today. Thanks again to our guest. And hope everybody has a wonderful rest of your day. You too. Thanks forever. Bye bye.