Massive corporations are draining rural communities' water resources — but this town is fighting backWelcome to Cochise County, Arizona, where...

Published on by

Massive corporations are draining rural communities' water resources — but this town is fighting backWelcome to Cochise County, Arizona, where...
Massive corporations are draining rural communities' water resources — but this town is fighting back

Welcome to Cochise County, Arizona, where residents pursue their passions, care for their land, and fight against large corporations to protect their water. A small town in this county recently made an important case for putting politics aside to safeguard the Earth.

"Water isn't Republican or Democrat. When your well is dry, it's dry," said Ed Curry, a fourth-generation farmer, according to a report featured in the Environmental Defense Fund's Vital Signs newsletter. But farmers never imagined that the water table below their crops would go dry.

In 1998, resident Steve Kisiel aimed to build a house among the scrubby mesquite trees of Cochise, first digging a well to ensure he could have running water at home. At 370 feet, he tapped into a stable, bountiful source of groundwater and started on his dream home.

But "in 2012, even though he and his wife only lived there part-time, the well ran dry. In a little over a decade, the water level had dropped more than 100 feet," the EDF reported in Vital Signs.

So what happened in the intervening years? Big corporations took advantage of Arizona's relaxed water protection laws and drained the water table of its supply.

"In about 75% of Arizona, there's no limit on how much water you can pump out of the ground," Chris Kuzdas, an Environmental Defense Fund expert on environmental issues in Arizona, told Vital Signs. "Whoever's got the longest straw can come and take as much water as they want for free."

This area has a long history of agriculture, and there has always been enough water to go around. It wasn't until companies realized that Arizona is an H2O gold mine that the ground dried up.

In 2014, a large Minnesota-based dairy operation called Riverview bought a feedlot in Cochise County. Riverview would be legally obligated to monitor and report its water usage in Minnesota; however, there's no such law in Arizona. As a result, Riverview expanded the cattle operation in Cochise from 10,000 to 150,000 cows, massively increasing the strain on resources.

This is far from the only example of corporate greed digging deep into the water table.

"In 2014, a Saudi Arabian conglomerate began growing thousands of acres of alfalfa in Arizona to feed the kingdom's cattle," according to the EDF's Vital Signs report. "Corporate nut growers planted pistachio and pecan trees where scrubby mesquite once grew. Private equity firms bought farmland simply to sell the water rights to newly developed Phoenix suburbs."

By 2018, the community couldn't reach any water within 409 feet of the ground's surface. This is much deeper than any domestic well descends. Additionally, giant fissures formed, damaging homes and instilling fear among residents. They had to take action.

Residents couldn't wait any longer for local lawmakers to take action. They began to look for help elsewhere. Arizona Gov. Katie Hobbs, who campaigned on this issue in the 2022 gubernatorial race, made the rounds to rural communities across the state to discuss water protection laws.

In January, Arizona's water department "designated the Willcox Basin as an active management area, which puts a stop to expanding irrigation," according to the Vital Signs report. "Major water users will now have to conserve, measure and report their use."

The community of Cochise County strongly values its independence and fears government overreach. But residents now work with water officials to solve problems and make changes.

"People have hope that they can finally have a say in how they manage their own water, and their future," Kuzdas said.

Attached link

https://www.thecooldown.com/green-business/cochise-county-arizona-drought-farming-water-scarcity/?utm_source=flipboard&utm_content=topic/environment

Taxonomy