Water claims to be settled?
Hearing set for Navajo-Gallup water agreement, path for pipeline

By Kathy Helms
Diné Bureau

WINDOW ROCK — The Senate Energy & Natural Resources Committee will hear testimony Wednesday in Washington on legislation introduced in April by U.S. Sen. Jeff Bingaman, D-N.M., that would settle the Navajo Nation's claims to water in the San Juan River Basin.

Bingaman, who heads up the committee, will chair the 2:30 p.m. hearing on the Northwestern New Mexico Rural Water Projects Act.

The legislation, co-sponsored by U.S. Sen. Pete Domenici, R-N.M., calls for the federal government to contribute funding over about two decades to construct the Navajo-Gallup Water Supply Pipeline, and to take other steps to settle Navajo's water rights claims to the San Juan. Domenici is ranking Republican on the committee.

Navajo Nation President Joe Shirley Jr., New Mexico State Engineer John D'Antonio, and Albuquerque Bernalillo County Water Utility Authority Executive Director Mark Sanchez will provide testimony.

Others witnesses include: Mark Limbaugh, assistant secretary for Water and Science, U.S. Department of the Interior; Carl Artman, assistant secretary for Indian Affairs, U.S. Department of Interior; Herb Guenther, director, Arizona Department of Water Resources; Patricia Lundstrom, executive director, Northwest New Mexico Council of Governments; and Victor Marshall, attorney for the San Juan Agricultural Water Users.

The legislation, S.1171, would amend the Colorado River Storage Project Act and Public Law 87-483 to authorize the construction and rehabilitation of water infrastructure in northwest New Mexico. It also would authorize the use of funding from the Bureau of Reclamation to fund the Reclamation Water Settlements Fund; the conveyance of certain Reclamation land and infrastructure; and authorize the Commissioner of Reclamation to provide for the delivery of water.

At a June 6 hearing in Farmington, Shirley threw his support behind the Navajo-Gallup Water Supply Project and BOR's preferred alternative, the San Juan River Public Service Company of New Mexico Alternative.

"The project is critical to providing a secure, permanent homeland for the Navajo people," Shirley said. "Without this project, Navajo families will continue to haul water and economic growth will be discouraged. With this project, most Navajo families will finally have potable drinking water in their homes in the Eastern Navajo Agency."

However, Red Lake Chapter President J.C. Begay, at a June 5 BOR meeting in Shiprock, said the Navajo-Gallup pipeline project leaves out Red Valley and Cove areas, located near Shiprock, where the groundwater is contaminated from past uranium mining.

"I think that equity of the distribution of water should be a fair allocation to the communities," he said.

"If you're going to be serving the Window Rock/St. Michael's area, why not also serve our community as well, and not so much emphasis on the Gallup community? We are the Navajo people that need the water and it's not fair to all the chapters not to be included," Begay said.

The project would consist of two pipelines covering 267 miles, including the San Juan Lateral which would divert and treat water from the San Juan River just west of the Nenahnezad Chapter to supply communities in the Shiprock area.

From there, the pipeline follows U.S. Highway 491 south to connect with systems in Crownpoint, Gallup and Window Rock. The second pipeline, the Cutter Lateral would divert and treat water from Cutter Reservoir east of Bloomfield, then pump water to Eastern Navajo Agency, Ojo Encino and the Jicarilla Apache Nation along U.S. Highway 550.

Out of 110 Navajo Nation chapters, 43 would be serviced by the project.

Secretary of the Interior Dirk Kempthorne, in a June 8 letter to New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson, approved a new Hydrologic Determination for the San Juan River, paving the way for construction of the billion-dollar Navajo-Gallup Water Supply Project.

"The finding in the Determination that there is likely to be sufficient water to support the proposed contract removes any Department of Interior concern about potential limitations of water supply," Kempthorne said.

Steve Cone of Citizens Progressive Alliance in Farmington said Kempthorne's concurrence with the revamped Hydrologic Determination is essential for further water development of the San Juan River because New Mexico has bumped up against the ceiling of its share of Colorado River Compact allocations.

"The Bureau's revised Hydrologic Determination is based on numerous controversial assumptions, but it is a boon to water development interests in that it invites New Mexico to further deplete and effectively desiccate the San Juan River, jeopardizing the hydrologic future of the entire Basin and portending catastrophe for the Colorado River system," Cone said.

After decades of data collection and interpretation, including tree ring studies by the University of Arizona and U.S. Geological Survey, it is well understood that when the Colorado River was first divvied-up, overly generous allocations to the seven Colorado River Basin States were based on erroneous predictions, according to Cone.

"Now, rather than conducting a more objective analysis of water availability, Reclamation's water experts are tempting fate by repeating the same mistake with a logic so twisted as to defy reason," he said.

"According to Bureau hydrologists and based on the New Mexico State Engineer's calculations, just the right quantity of water needed to fill the Navajo-Gallup Pipeline is now available. It has been found, miraculously, by factoring-in reduced evaporation rates due to the region's most recent drought.

"Since less water is evaporating from drought-shrunken reservoirs, the Bureau argues, more water is actually available for development. Eureka! Less is more," Cone said.

Following introduction of Bingaman's legislation in the Senate in April, Gov. Richardson hailed it "as the next big step forward" from the settlement signed by him and President Shirley almost exactly two years ago.

"We worked our way to this agreement through respect for each others' sovereign rights and responsibilities and we are pleased that our congressional delegation has launched it on the next level of consideration," Richardson said.