February 14, 2008
SNWA Water Pipeline Labeled "Boondoggle"

Photo by Dave Maxwell Locals attending Caliente water hearing

By Dave Maxwell, Staff Writer

Support for the proposed water applications to take water from Cave, Dry Lake, and Delamar Valleys, and build a pipeline to Las Vegas, came mostly from Las Vegas citizens during a teleconferenced day of public comment February 7. It was obvious however, that the majority of the other people involved have a completely different view.

The State Water Engineer's office, holding water hearings on the Southern Nevada Water Authority (SNWA) applications in Carson City, February 4-15, allowed February 7 to be a day of oral public comment.

Groups of interested people gathered at locations in Carson City, Ely, the Cooperative Extension Office in Caliente, and the Sawyer Building in Las Vegas, to furnish televised input to the meeting of the Nevada Division of Water Resources. The video link meeting was moderated by Susan Joseph Taylor.

Opposition to the pipeline from rural residents and environmental activists was loud. Caliente resident Dorothy Wadsworth Ray said, “I’ve been here all my life, and I resent Las Vegas coming up here and making decisions for us that are going to affect our daily lives….I think the other 16 rural counties of Nevada are beginning to realize that we have resources the bigger places want…and this will not stop.”

Dr. Tom Sanders of Ely called the pipeline “the biggest public boondoggle this country has ever seen. It’s going to make the Oklahoma Dust Bowl look like it never happened.”

Louis Benezet of Pioche said, “Water has become a commodity, going to the highest bidder.” And, as voiced, by others, the matter is one of “Las Vegas politics and greed.”

A number of people called on the Water Authority to abandon the pipeline and pursue desalinated Pacific Ocean water. SNWA claims a large-scale operation to purify seawater is too expensive and complicated to address the water needs of Las Vegas in the short term.

Delaine Spilsbury said the water being sought in Lincoln and White Pine counties exists only in the “mythical underground lake in Mrs. Mulroy’s water dreams,” referring to SNWA General Manager Patricia Mulroy. Ms. Spilsbury also said such a water grab would “destroy our hunting and gathering northeast sources for corporate profits.” She, along with several others, pointed out that taking all the water from the three basins would leave none for wildlife or vegetation that live there. Does Vegas care?

SNWA is requesting a total of 35,000 acre-feet (11.3 billion gallons) of water per year from the three valleys in Lincoln County, enough for about 120,000 homes. The water would be pumped to Las Vegas through a pipeline extending into White Pine County as well, some 250 miles north of Las Vegas. The project is expected to cost upward of $3 billion and could begin delivering water by 2015.

State Water Engineer Tracy Taylor will use testimony from the hearings and other information to decide how much groundwater, if any, SNWA should be allowed to pump from Lincoln County.

SNWA claims it will be able to place a number of monitoring stations and mitigating measures designed to protect the environment.

Input given in Las Vegas was markedly in favor of the project. Nearly all of the 35 people in attendance there said they are in favor of the project. Danny Thompson of the AFL-CIO and Andy Fegley of the LV Chamber of Commerce said the water is needed to fuel the valley’s economy and, by extension, the economy of the state. Thompson went on to say that “approving the applications is the only way to preserve the public interests of the State of Nevada.” This left the listener with the distinct impression that “What’s good for Las Vegas is good for the rest of the state.”

Letters of support for the project were put into the public record from various unions, developers, and prominent Las Vegas Valley leaders, including Mayor Oscar Goodman and Jim Rogers, Chancellor of University of Nevada, Las Vegas.

However, Launce Rake, of the Progressive Leadership Alliance of Nevada, was one of two people in the Las Vegas audience who spoke against the project. “In all my work as a (newspaper) reporter and now an activist,” he said, “I have yet to meet a single independent scientist who has looked closely at these plans and doesn’t think they will have a significant deleterious impact. Not one.”

Rake also pointed out that “the same agency (SNWA) that says it will do anything to get the rural water appears to be in large part responsible for the monitoring and mitigation of the impacts of its own plans. That’s dangerous….and we do not trust the Water Authority.” He added, “I think what the political representatives of Southern Nevada are saying is very clear: This huge part of the United States will die so that Las Vegas will continue to grow.”

Opponents to the pipeline project will present their case, involving facts and figures, before the Water Resources Board February 11-15. The state engineer is accepting written public comment through February 29.