California representatives have offered to forgo up to 8 percent of the state’s Colorado River water, if things get bad enough. The worry is cuts would be worse later if California doesn’t play ball with Arizona now.
By Ry Rivard | Voice of San Dieago
Twenty-six million people in California, Nevada and Arizona rely on the Colorado River, but this magnificent source of water that carved a continent is drying up.
Representatives of the three states have been huddling behind closed doors and, for the first time ever, California water officials are offering to give up some of the state’s strongest claims to the river – at least temporarily.
The thermometer of the river’s health is Lake Mead — the lake formed behind Hoover Dam. The lake is now lower than it’s been since it was first filled back in the mid-1930s.
