Navajo, city find accord
Officials see progress in securing water for Gallup

By Zsombor Peter
Staff Writer

GALLUP — What a difference Congress makes.

When Navajo Nation President Joe Shirley Jr. and New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson signed off on a historic water rights settlement on April 19, 2005, divvying up the long-contested waters of the San Juan River Basin between the tribe and state, Gallup officials were thrilled. It cleared the way for a pipeline that would send 7,500 acre feet of San Juan water its way per year. But there was a problem: The city would have permission to send 7,500 acre feet down the pipeline; it just didn't have the water to do it.

Now, just one week after Sen. Jeff Bingaman, D-N.M., introduced a bill asking for congressional approval of the settlement, Gallup officials are reporting major progress toward finding that water. City Manager Eric Honeyfield said city and tribal staff are very close to a settlement of their own, one that would lend some of the Navajo Nation's water rights to the city.

Gallup Joint Utilities Director Lance Allgood wouldn't attribute all the progress to the bill's recent introduction, but it's also more than a coincidence. At the very least, "it adds a reason to move things along," he said.

Both parties, Honeyfield said, left a semi-final negotiating session in Gallup earlier this week "feeling very good."

Honeyfield said they might need one or two more meetings to finish up. After that, the proposal would head to the Navajo Nation Council and then the Gallup City Council for approval.

At the tribe's request, Honeyfield declined to discuss details. But it appears there aren't all that many details to discuss just yet. Some of the most important — exactly how much water the city would get, for how long, and for how much — have yet to be filled in.

"It sounds like there's a lot left hanging," Honeyfield conceded, "but there's not really."

Just agreeing on how to share some of the water in the pipeline, he said, was a major step forward.

It would work something like this: The city's 7,500 acre feet of capacity is guaranteed. The rest of the 30,000 acre feet the pipeline will be able to handle is promised to the tribe. But when water finally starts flowing down it's length, 20 or so years from now, the tribe won't have customers to buy all the water. Those customers will come with time. Until then, the tribe can sell some of it to the city — if the deal gets approved.

Though important, Honeyfield said, it would be only a temporary solution for the city. Whenever the deal expired, it will have to go searching for water rights once again.

As for the G-22 water field, a section of the San Andreas-Glorietta aquifer near Fort Wingate the city wants to tap as an additional water supply, the deal would also settle some of the Navajo Nation's concerns about the project.

Because drawing water from the field could potentially deplete some tribal supplies nearby, the Navajo Nation has been protesting development. Again without going into detail, Honeyfield said the deal would make various concessions to the tribe and guarantee that the city would replace any tribal supplies the project depleted.

None of the tribe's negotiators could be reached for comment.