Can Education Turn Around a Groundwater Junkie?
Last Tuesday night, some 500 West Valley customers of Arizona American Water Company filed into Surprise Stadium to jeer, cheer, hoot and holler. No, they weren't there to commiserate their Spring Training "home" team's second consecutive loss in the Fall Classic. And they weren't there to soak in the hot dog scented atmosphere of the taxpayer funded ballpark on an unseasonably cold December evening.
They were there to express outrage at the company that delivers water to their homes and businesses for requesting an increase in rates. The company, Arizona American Water Company, filed a rate case with the Arizona Corporation Commission asking for a sizeable (82 percent) increase in rates for service to customers in its Agua Fria division, which serves many communities in the West Valley, including Surprise and Sun City. The main reason for the rate increase is to recover the costs that Arizona American sank into a surface water treatment plant in anticipation of growth and to move off pumping groundwater, a non-renewable source of water. The White Tanks Water Treatment Plant, which became operational in 2009, treats and sanitizes water from the Central Arizona Project (a renewable source of water) for delivery to customers.
Despite the fact that both the Arizona Corporation Commission and the Arizona Department of Water Resources supported the decision to construct the plant as a prudent approach to conserving groundwater and achieving safe yield of the aquifer, angry customers insist the plant is a white elephant that they shouldn't have to pay for. They want "their" good tasting groundwater back.
To the angry customers, I have two thoughts to offer.
First, we do, in fact, live in a desert. Water is scarce. In Arizona's arid climate, water is a precious resource that cannot be easily or inexpensively replenished when exhausted. It is not like water supplies that serve places like Chicago, Milwaukee or New Jersey. Arizona's 1980 Groundwater Management Act established rules and guidelines for preserving our non-renewable groundwater for that very reason.
Second, it's true that the explosive growth in the West Valley did not occur along the path originally predicted five years ago. That doesn't mean that it won't occur in the years ahead, once the economy gets back on track. Not only do we need to plan for this growth by investing in essential infrastructure like the White Tanks Water Treatment plant, but failing to make adequate investments in infrastructure is a sure-fire way to kill-off growth. Those who argue against investing in infrastructure have failed to consider the longer-term implications. Inadequate infrastructure means businesses and families will find better places to locate and within which to live. West Valley politicians arguing that a rate increase today to pay for infrastructure will harm the economy and delay development are missing this very important point.
These are not my arguments alone. I hear them often from water providers, water management advocates and those advocating sustainable growth. Yet, our collective efforts to educate the public on water scarcity and water sense in Arizona seems to frequently miss its mark.
Too many Arizonans just want the good stuff; they want it when they want it; at the price they want it; without regard to the long-term effects.
Let's hope education can turn them around. Our future depends on it.