Posted on 02/23/2008 4:49:44 PM PST by americanophile
PALM SPRINGS - The flamboyant mayor of Las Vegas may have opened up a multistate water war last week, when he said "no one is going to allow us to go dry" and vowed to go after Southern California's water, it was reported today.
Mayor Oscar Goodman's comments come as officials from Wyoming to Mexico contemplate the prospect of a shriveling Colorado River, where global climate changes might dry up much of the vast water supply for people from Tucson to Tijuana, and Denver to Los Angeles.
Goodman reportedly said last week that farmers in California "will have their fields go fallow before our spigots run dry." Those comments were made last Thursday, when the Las Vegas mayor was asked for comment about a new climate study that predicts such diminished flows in the Colorado River that Lake Mead and Lake Powell will be sucked dry.
"We'll see you at the battlefront," Goodman was quoted as saying by the Desert Sun newspaper of Palm Springs.
Battles over Colorado River supplies are not new. In 1934, Arizona's governor sent the state's National Guard to the Colorado River to prevent Los Angeles from building Parker Dam, and removed the troops only after a federal court ordered an end to hostilities.
In California, Coachella Valley Water District general manager Steve Robbins called the latest Las Vegas threats "ridiculous and inflammatory."
The Imperial Irrigation District views the Nevada threats as "the latest in a series of salvos directed at the farms and fields of the Imperial Valley," said spokesman Kevin Kelley.
University of Utah law professor Robert Adler told the Desert Sun that the Vegas mayor's comments may be a "kind of political statement, rather than a statement based on legal rights."
Farms in the Coachella and Imperial valleys are called the breadbasket of the southwest, and crops and animals grown there feed much of the country, including Las Vegas, farmers say. Surplus water from the desert is already in the process of being acquired by San Diego and other coastal cities.
Farms in California get 11 times more water than Las Vegas is allocated under a multistate agreement brokered by Congress in 1922. A new revision of the Colorado River Compact has been negotiated by the federal government and water users, to accommodate urban growth and decreased water supplies.
GW Ping
Get your own Owens Valley, Nevada. We stole our own water fair and square.
Las Vegas has been buying ranches in Northern Nevada as far as 450 miles from Las Vegas. They intend to suck millions of acre feet of water and pipe it to So Nevada.
They are on a march, and they don’t care who or what they hurt in the process.
Las Vegas has grown into the 800 pound gorilla.
Here’s hoping the courts step in very soon. Harry Reid and his cohorts are behind most of this. Goodman is a straw figure, covering up for Reid.
The old saying: in the West, water flows uphill towards money.
Guess they think you can eat or you can gamble, and they think gamble is more important.
Wonder where all the food for those big buffets will come from? Guess Oscar hasn’t thought this thru any more than Harry Reid has.
Going out on a limb here but wouldn’t this years epic snowfall records end this debate once it all melts in a month or so?
Build a city in a desert, and this is what we get. Meanwhile, we are forced to listen to these Gore-maniacs tell us that it’s due to global warming. Next thing you know, they’ll be telling us about water shortages in the Kalahari Desert being due to global warming.
Mayor must be ignorant of his American History -— “The Lincoln County War” was over water rights. He better re-read the end result.
Mayor Oscar Goodman=Stupid North East Lib
They are on a march, and they don’t care who or what they hurt in the process.
I'm ok with anyone, including cities, buying water rights. Its when people start to petition the government to force others to sell, using Eminent Domain, or other swindles, that I'm against. If that happens, it could get real ugly.
The reduced flow of the Colorado river has nothing to do with global warming. It has everything to do with the population & development boom in the southwest. Increasing demand, not decreasing supply. Of course, the MSM just has to get their plug in there for ManBearPig.
Meanwhile, Oscar Goldman puts multi-million dollar man and bigfoot on high alert.
"no one is going to allow us to go dry"
OK:
"Let them drink Perrier!"
(take that Las Vegas)
Maybe if they shut down all those desert golf courses.......
We’ll just keep it all in Colorado until they can learn to play nice.
Not even close.
Too many back to back years of "little or no" snowmelt to replenish.
It would take a decade or so of "epic snowfall records" to get back to a normal level in Lake Mead.
The water wars are certainly going on within the state. Can't blame the folks from up north for being pissed about it, I would be.
The biggest issue though, is the intrastate distribution of the water from the Colorado River....
Nevada needs more, Arizona needs more, California needs more.
California, having the most people affected by this coming crisis, has one option to use that Nevada and Arizona does not............
The Pacific Ocean and desalinization.
California needs to get with the program and spend the money to do that.
They are the only one, of the affected states, that has the option to use an alternate water source. We don't, other than suck the northern part of the state dry. Arizona does not have any viable alternatives......California does.
Our population explosion and development boom is going to cause all kinds of environmental problems, health problems, and shortages leading to an increased cost of resources. Just look at the increasing demand for oil. All the alternative energy sources in the world will not offset demand due to growth in population. But hey, let’s just keep bringing in the millions a year across our borders because after all, that’s not our biggest threat.
The ethanol production requires a tremendous amount of water to grow the corn....one of the many unintended consequences. We may have water wars someday as water comes at a premium in some areas, further driving up food costs!
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