For several years now, the Tucson area has managed to grasp the brass ring of water users in Arizona.

On multiple occasions recently, the "Tucson Active Management Area,"as the region is known, rightfully could claim bragging rights to having achieved "safe-yield" with its groundwater.

Not always. Not consistently. Not yet. But tantalizingly close to consistently, the so-called Tucson AMA has recharged as much or more water back into area aquifers as it has pumped out.