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Category: Front Page News Front Page News
Published: 04 November 2019 04 November 2019

By Mary Alice Murphy

Following a sometimes threatening and confrontational session with members of the Interim Legislative Water and Natural Resources Committee meeting in the morning, the NM CAP Entity met in a special meeting Oct. 17, 2019 in the afternoon to discuss a preferred alternative of the proposed action. The elements of the proposed action remain, but one would come out on top at the end of the meeting.

The New Mexico Central Arizona Project Entity was created as an agency by the Arizona Water Settlements Act, which allocated 14,000 acre-feet of new water and funding of about $90 million, which is coming into the New Mexico Unit Fund and up to $62 million to construct a New Mexico Unit diversion project.

In public comment, Allyson Siwik, Gila Conservation Coalition executive director, commented on the prior meeting. "What a meeting that was this morning!"

"What (CAP Entity Attorney Pete) Domenici presented this morning seems like a last-minute, last-ditch effort to save the unit" she said. "The CAP Entity's been in disarray since day one. And for the record, this is the ninth change to the proposed action. For people who are not used to working with the NEPA process, this is highly irregular. It's not the way the NEPA process is supposed to go. It seems like Mr. Domenici figured this out behind the scenes. It seems to hold the whole fantasy alive to spend money on a unit. This concern continues to lock away and hoard New Mexico Unit Fund moneys. There is $64 million tied up. I hope we'll hear more today. You said Alternative D doesn't include anything but Virden. That's an example of a lot of information not being available to the public."

CAP Entity member representing Luna County, John Sweetser asked: "Would there be any diversion you would agree with?"

Siwik replied: "I don't know. Let's hear what you're talking about today."

Entity member Joe Runyan, representing the Gila Farm Ditch, asked: "Right now we have three gravel berms blocking the river flow to divert water to our ditches. Wouldn’t it be better to put up a 100-year permanent structure?"

Chairwoman Darr Shannon, representing the Hidalgo Soil and Water Conservation District, said: "We feel the environmental community is totally against us."

Norman Gaume, engineer, said he was speaking for himself in public comment.

"This is a story-telling approach to doing a project," Gaume said. "It is not engineering- or science-based. Does everybody here know the business today is to change the proposed action to only the Virden project as the only proposed action? There's obviously been discussion among you. That's a rolling quorum. I'm going to carefully listen to the water and natural resource committee meeting this morning. If I believe you have discussed this issue outside this meeting, I will file a violation of the Open Meetings Act. The second thing I wanted to bring up was that in the business plan and in the preliminary draft environmental impact statement, you say that you can come up with a reliable stable water supply. Neither the EIS nor the business plan recognize that there will be interruptions in supply. Another part of the lack of analysis is that you don't have a firm supply; you will have drought years; and you don't understand the CUFA (Consumptive Use and Forbearance Agreement), which I've been suggesting to you is the foundation of this project."

Domenici said: "I want to clarify to Ms. Siwik. I think you implied that somehow you're been cut out of knowing the proposed action. Those alternatives, including D, have not changed. They've been available to you all this time."

Allen Campbell, representing the Gila Hotsprings Ditch Association, said:
"I would like to respond to Mr. Gaume's allegation. This agenda has been the only information I have received along with the minutes, over the past month. Has anyone else had contact with Mr. Domenici or Anthony Gutierrez (executive director)?"

Shannon said she received the request and the agenda for a special meeting the previous Friday and sent it out to the members.

"So, Mr. Gaume again makes accusations without basis, as is his wont," Campbell said.

Under new business, Domenici said they had received notification from the Secretary of the Interior that they could meet with him on Oct. 24 or 25. "We have committed to meeting with the Secretary on Oct. 24, Anthony, Howard (Hutchinson, representing the San Francisco Soil and Water Conservation District) and myself. An extension would allow access to the construction funds. No extension, no access. I don't know the chances. I looked at the Governor's, the GRIC (Gila River Indian Community), Sen. Udall's and Sen. Heinrich's documents, all encouraging the denial of the extension. I brainstormed with Anthony, trying to find out what we would be questioned on by the Secretary. I determined it is important to be prepared. We will never get support from GRIC. They have already received funding from the Lower Colorado River Basin Fund and a lot of water rights, but I think they want more money from the fund. I know the governor doesn't want more diversions on the Gila. I think it's different to have construction on old diversions, but I don't think she wants a new diversion. In terms of a new diversion, Virden is not new. I also considered that to complete the Virden final design, costs would have to come out of the unit costs for ponds in Virden. It's not significant. We have the design, the depths and the locations. Anyone can say anything about what they heard this morning. Engineering costs would be nominal and permitting may not be needed. We will have construction funds for issues. We haven't heard a single environmental concern about diverting into ponds to a short stretch of the Gila, which is all on private property. They have had years to do studies if there had been environmental demands. If you have concerns, bring them forward now. Many people who support us want us to trigger CUFA and the exchange and take New Mexico's long-standing allocations. Doing it within New Mexico, just miles from Arizona, is easily depicted as objectively accurate and it's been a part of the EIS study. I don't think anyone can say it will impact the Gila Wilderness. If they say it about Virden, they are undercutting their arguments. Water doesn't flow uphill. I plan to explain what I just described. It's a difficult decision, but it's the best of the worst options, the worst being no option. It's a sad day for the CAP Entity, but if we go this direction, I will advise you that it is the best option to tie up the construction funding."

Rolf Schmidt-Petersen, Interstate Stream Commission director, asked if it would be modifying the alternative.

"There is no change to the proposed action," Domenici said. "The idea is to consider identifying it as the preferred alternative to the joint leads (which are the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation and the ISC)."

Gutierrez said there was confusion about the agenda item. "Is it a preferred alternative or is it a change to the proposed action?"

"I don't want to make any changes to the proposed action," Domenici said. "We just want Alternative D to be the preferred alternative."

Runyan said there had been a lot of confusion at the chaotic meeting that morning. "I would like to address the obfuscation of facts and the mischaracterizations by the legislators in the questions they asked. It was confusing, with overwhelming negativism on their part. I support this alternative. My people want it on the Gila."

Ty Bays, representing the Grant Soil and Water Conservation District, said: "If we don't get buy-in on the extension, are we dead?"

"Not necessarily dead," Domenici said, "but we will lose access to the construction funding. This is the best alternative. How can we let the 14,000 acre-feet go after all these studies and work? We're trying to get the extension and if we can't get it, then the argument to the ISC is the same as to the secretary, because this is low cost, we expect you to fund it. Everything has political decisions driving it."

Bays asked: "So we write a letter to the Bureau of Reclamation asking them?"

"In essence, we will authorize sending a letter to the joint leads that Virden-only is the preferred action," Domenici said.

Bays said it was disheartening that the environmental community and the Grant County Commission oppose diversions. "In our lifetime, I want us to see this water. Maybe Virden will be the chance."

He made a basic motion, but Hutchinson said he thought the agenda item was wrongly written. "On behalf of the San Francisco River project, I empathize with Runyan. I would like to see construction funds for San Francisco projects. We discussed using the Unit Fund for San Francisco construction. At the time, we didn't want to use the Unit Fund. Our concerns were the costs of the EIS on the San Francisco. It doesn't stop the record of decision. We will complete the EIS, there will be a record of decision, and there will be analyses. The public will get a chance to comment to Reclamation and the ISC as joint leads. Our major concern was the cost of the EIS on the San Francisco. Storage was never contemplated on the San Francisco for construction funding. We will look at other funding. I realize the point we've arrived at has nothing to do with the viability of our projects, but only with politics and some environmental groups."

Campbell thanked Hutchinson for speaking to where "we are. My concern, and I find it odious, speaks to what happened in the Owens Valley in California, and the loss of water to rural areas. This is the loss of a single battle, but it's not a total loss. The AWSA will persevere and we will not quit. This is the best route to take at this time."

Van "Bucky" Allred, representing Catron County, said he wanted to speak out on behalf of his constituency. "I knew and know the Catron County folks who blazed the trail. When I became a part of the CAP Entity, I had been to a lot of rodeos. This water could be a game-changer for my county. I've never seen Mr. Gaume talking to the folks who blazed the trail and have skin in the game. When we tried to talk about fallow lands to be irrigated and the programs that could benefit the residents, politics made the determination. But it's OK for Catron County to have the spotted owl, the wild and scenic designation. It's all politics. Projects on the river benefit our land and our county. I will go to my dying days supporting this project."

Vance Lee, representing Hidalgo County, said he has been saying for 15 years, through the Southwest New Mexico Planning Group, the Gila-San Francisco Water Commission and this CAP Entity, "it's about the water. I find it unfortunate that due to politics, we are not able to do what is right for this area and that we have to acquiesce to politics. I feel it is right to move forward with the Virden-only alternative to secure water for southwest New Mexico. We're just trying to do the right thing for this part of New Mexico."

Shannon said: "The environmental community took such strong action it has backed us into a corner. They misunderstand what we're trying to accomplish."

She read the motion as she understood it and there were many changes in wording until it became a motion to "send a letter to the joint leads, the Bureau of Reclamation and the Interstate Stream Commission, to designate Alternative D, 'the Virden-only' alternative as the preferred alternative in the final EIS. The New Mexico CAP Entity is not requesting any change to the proposed action."

Jeff Riley, Reclamation engineer, attending by telephone, said the second sentence conflicts with the first sentence. "Alternative B will stay as is."

Domenici said: "If we want to continue to receive study analysis, we don't want to stop the analyses of A, B, and C."

Riley confirmed all had been evaluated in the draft EIS.

Schmidt-Petersen said: "The joint leads when they got to the preliminary draft stage said they would not entertain any future changes."

Hutchinson called for the vote, which received all ayes.

The next item was the executive director report and the member roundtable.

"I have no report," Gutierrez said. "This is my comment for the roundtable. I continue to hear public comments. They talk about what they read on the Gila Conservation Coalition website. It's a fairy tale. Mr. Gaume, we used your information to develop our yield based on your information. We all sat down and agreed to the model and yield and you come up and say we don't have good engineering. You're not the only engineer in the community. Allyson advocates for all these water projects. I was the county planning director and I never saw you at an ICIP (Infrastructure Capital Improvement Plan) meeting or any other meeting about them."

Robert "B.J." Agnew, representing the Upper Gila Irrigation District, said: "I just want to know why the word settlements is in the title of the AWSA, if no one wants to follow them."

Bays said: "Mr. Gaume is on record for lying. It seems to be endemic. It's the problem with these radical million dollar-funded extremist environmental groups. They do it every day and so anything you say to this board, I don't believe you."

Domenici said to Gaume: "I want to say something, perhaps more conciliatory. I don't know how familiar you are with farming practices in Virden. Many years, they have had no water. They have conjunctive use, surface and ground water. Going forward, we need to face that data. We will face that it in the future. It doesn't present a precarious situation because of their years of experience farming and the types of crops they grow."

Campbell said: "We have an extreme amount of anger coming from mostly from the left-hand side, the liberal side. It's part and parcel of what's going on. I think we are bordering on a political coup on the president of the U.S. It's really very, very tawdry. We are having to fight an uphill battle, and we'll keep on fighting. This will be revisited in the future, when it is a more agreeable political time, because an injustice doesn't stand for long."

Sweetser said he would like to apologize to Siwik. "People have been opposed for so long that it's hard to come to an agreement, but I hope we can."

The next meeting was set for Wednesday, Nov. 6, but has been cancelled. The next meeting will tentatively take place Dec. 3, 2019 at 10 a.m. at the Grant County Administration Center.