By Phil Riske | Managing Editor, Rose Law Group Reporter
STATE CAPITOL – Without future action necessary because of population growth and drought conditions, Arizona will be short three million acre feet of water by 2110, the sponsor of a comprehensive water bill told a legislative committee Tuesday.
“What are we doing for the generations ahead?” asked a fired-up House Speaker Andy Tobin R-Pauldin, sponsor of HB 2338, a bill that would create Regional Water Augmentation (RWAA) authorities to help local communities develop water supplies and water supply infrastructure to meet growing needs.
Tobin’s question goes unanswered for now as the House Agriculture and Water Committee Chairman Brenda Barton R-Payson, held the bill after opposition was expressed by dozens of witnesses.
The RWAAs would be voluntary organizations formed by at least one governmental entity and private groups to provide a mechanism to pool their resources to develop water supply projects. The authorities would have the power to acquire, sell, lease, exchange, occupy, manage or possess or otherwise dispose of real and personal property needed for water supplies or RWAA projects.
The bill would require a $30 million allocation from the state general fund this year, and would require more than $3 billion in infrastructure investments in the next 50 years, according to a study by the Water Resources Development Commission formed 11 years ago to find out what the water issues were.
“We are not here to push the problem under the desk,” Tobin said, adding it’s the first time rural and urban people have worked together on water issues. He said the bill must “move on without people who don’t want to solve the problem.”
Tobin has stated his bill is not perfect and perhaps he anticipated the heavy opposition that was expressed in a three-hour House Agriculture and Water Committee hearing.
“This bill has started a war,” said one witness representing Yuma.
Agricultural and other interests opposed the bill, some saying it is a “water grab,” such as Yuma County Supervisor Russ Parks.
“This is a water grab [and] a direct threat to Yuma’s economic viability,” Parks said.
Cheryl Chase, Pinal County supervisor who requested the bill be held, said the bill circumvents the authority of country supervisors and the RWWAs would not be accountable to taxpayers.
Former Rep. Russ Jones of Yuma said he feared the RWWAs would become “water fiefdoms that might not play nice.”
Others speaking against the bill said there is no language to protect surface water rights and a limited eminent domain provision in the bill to enable water projects gives the RWWAs extremely broad powers.
“Eminent domain is the ultimate regulatory power,” Parks said. Under the bill, the RWWAs would not be regulated by the Arizona Corporation Commission.
Kathy Ferris of the Arizona Municipal Water Users Association was a member of the Water Resources Development Commission. She said she was confused about opposition to the bill because urban, rural and other interests represented on the commission reached consensus on provisions of the bill.
Another witness disagreed, saying there was “dissent,” and no minority report was filed.
Agriculture did not express opposition at the time, Ferris testified.
“This is not a water grab . . . no one can take vested water rights,” Ferris said, adding the secretary of interior has to approve all water transfers from the Colorado River, to which Yuma County has senior rights.
Rep. Karen Fann, R-Prescott, said the bill does not harm any water rights or local economies. One advantage of the bill would be to enable the transfer of water from non-growth areas to areas of need.
Envionmentalists have stated the bill ignores water conservation.
Tobin said last week there might be a way to carve out exemptions for certain municipalities to ease their worries or push more money toward the rural areas, to ensure they are treated fairly. He said at the hearing that, if necessary, he would take eminent domain out of the bill.
Also: Arizona House Speaker Tobin pulls back two anti-union bills
