Water meeting elicits more questions, more answers

Hoping to answer questions about bringing Central Arizona Project water to Green Valley, Community Water Co. released documents on the issue last week, only to find Tuesday morning there were skeptics with more questions.

Participants at a water company forum crowded around information tables, asking such things as the ultimate cost of the plan and how long it would take to acquire state land for a water recharge basin.

Community Water says Rosemont Mining Co., an affiliate of Augusta Resource Corp., will pay to build a pipeline to deliver CAP water to the Green Valley area.

Rosemont plans to build a copper mine in the Santa Rita Mountains east of Green Valley.

For its operations, Rosemont would take water from the local aquifer from wells at Sahuarita and pipe it across the mountains. It would take water from the southern end of the CAP pipeline at Pima Mine Road and pump it to Green Valley for recharge. Before this deal was proposed, Rosemont had planned to recharge water in to the Tucson aquifer at Marana about 35 miles north.

More than 150 people listened as water company President Art Gabald—n outlined the agreement with Rosemont.

Gabald—n said the agreement was not the final solution to this area’s threatened water supply, “but its a darn good start.” He added, “We need to get the water down here.”

The local aquifer provides water for thousands of residential users in Mexico and Southern Arizona, for existing mining operations, agriculture users and golf courses.

Experts say the local water table is falling two to three feet a year.

During negotiations to get Rosemont to build a pipeline to the Green Valley Gabald—n said, the first idea of how to recharge the aquifer was “to just dump it into the Santa Cruz River.” a not-so-good idea.

“River recharge runs off,” as much as seven miles downstream he said. And it can pond in some places, meaning places of stagnant or mosquito-breeding water.

So he said Community Water decided to opt for an artificial recharge basin, and discovered that the most suitable location was on Arizona State Trust land.

Getting that land would be difficult. The state Land Department wants to get money for its land to help pay for education and by law it must sell to the highest bidder, said Gabald—n

Pima County Supervisor Ray Carroll, who opposes the deal with Rosemont, attended the meeting and said it raised more questions than it answered, especially what it would take to build a pipeline from Pima Mine Road to Green Valley.

“We don’t know the costs,” said Carroll.

And Carroll said the company hasn’t been forthcoming with other critical information.

Tom Ward, first vice president of Green Valley Community Coordinating Council, said paying for State Trust Land would surely increase the price.

Community Water has had five meetings with members and the public about the proposal.

In early December, the Arizona Corporation Commission plans to come to Green Valley for a hearing on the proposal.

jlamb@gvnews.com | 547-9749