By Mark Moran | Queen Creek Tribune
While some communities in Arizona still grow crops, Queen Creek is growing water. Simply by using effluent, or recycled water, the town will have more water from a just-completed deal to buy Colorado River water than it is importing.
“We’re getting 2,000-acre feet from Cibola,” said Paul Gardner, director of water resources, at the July 19 town council meeting, referring to the $27 million deal to bring water from Cibola in western Arizona to Queen Creek.
“After the first year you get 3,300-acre feet of water that second year,” he explained.
An acre-foot of water is about enough to cover a football field 1-foot deep, and enough to supply the needs of a typical family for two to three years. But looking forward, there will be even more water in Queen Creek thanks to other deals the town is working on to secure water from places other than underground.
Queen Creek recently signed a 5,000-acre foot, $30 million deal with the Harquahala Valley Landowners LLC, a group of landowners and farmers in Maricopa County west of Phoenix to further diversify the town’s water portfolio. But that deal, too, will provide more than the original amount.
“When we do 5,000-acre feet with Harquahala in the next tranche of water that we buy,” Gardner continued, “cumulative in year two because you get the-5,000 plus what you recharge and recover, you are to 8,300-acre feet,” thanks to the recycled effluent.
