WildEarth Guardians

Tuesday, April 11, 2006
Los Alamos Resolution Provides New Political and Financial Support for Rio Grande Restoration

Los Alamos County passes a resolution that will help protect and restore the Rio Grande, according to conservation groups who sought the council's support and worked with the Los Alamos water utility authority to draft the resolution
Contact: WildEarth Guardians

Los Alamos, NM - Los Alamos County passed a resolution this evening that will help protect and restore the Rio Grande, according to conservation groups who sought the council’s support and worked with the Los Alamos water utility authority to draft the resolution.

The resolution directs the water utility authority to establish a check-off program that will allow municipal water users to add $1 per month to their monthly water bills towards an account to purchase water rights for the Rio Grande. With this resolution Los Alamos becomes the second city in New Mexico to pass a municipal check-off program for the benefit of the Rio Grande.

“We believe that at the same time cities are looking to the Rio Grande to sustain us we must affirm our obligation to sustain the river itself,” said John Horning, WildEarth Guardians’ Executive Director. “This agreement is one piece of our obligation to ensure that the river is sustained for future generations of wildlife and people.”

In addition the resolution commits the county to provide $10,000 to support a pilot agricultural water leasing program in the Middle Rio Grande. The purpose of the water leasing program is to pay farmers to fallow their fields in exchange for allowing the unused water to remain in the Rio Grande, providing important flows to benefit the more than 450 species of wildlife that depend upon the river and its Bosque. The money to be provided by Los Alamos will be supplemented by $250,000 already committed through a similar agreement reached with the City of Albuquerque last April.

According to the New Mexico State Engineer’s Office, agriculture uses approximately 80-85% of the surface water in the Rio Grande, much of it to flood-irrigate alfalfa, one of the most water intensive crops grown. The agreement implicitly recognizes that working to obtain the support of the agricultural community for an innovative water leasing program provides the greatest opportunity to secure water for the Rio Grande.

“We hope that each of the agreements that we have reached as well as the ones we hope to reach in the coming months, will create a new economic and political foundation which ensures the Rio Grande reclaims rights to its own waters,” said Horning.

In discussions with the water utility authority the environmental groups agreed to support the counties’ plan to obtain a permanent contract to federal San Juan/Chama project water from the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation. Los Alamos’ current contract expires in the next decade putting future water supplies at greater risk. The San Juan/Chama project, built in the late 1960’s to bring water under the Continental Divide, provides water to more than a dozen entities in New Mexico, including Santa Fe and Albuquerque.

The environmental groups which sought the resolution’s passage include Defenders of Wildlife, the Sierra Club, National Audubon Society, New Mexico Audubon, as well as WildEarth Guardians. The groups say they hope to reach similar agreements with the City of Santa Fe and the dozen other San Juan/Chama project beneficiaries later this year.