ADWR holds informational meeting in Willcox on deteriorating groundwater conditions in the region

ADWR staff on September 26 brought groundwater data to a public meeting at the Willcox Community Center that depict plunging groundwater levels in many areas of the Willcox groundwater basin and worsening surface-level impacts from subsidence and fissuring.

Attended by 74 Willcox-area residents, as well as 65 online viewers, the informal public informational session illustrated the status of the Willcox Groundwater Basin and included information regarding potential management options, as well as hydrologic conditions.

Due to technical challenges experienced the evening of the presentations, both audio and video streamed online from the event proved to be of such poor quality that ADWR has re-recorded the staff presentations from that event. 

Those re-recorded presentations – the first by Chief Hydrologist Ryan Mitchell on groundwater and surface conditions in the basin; the second by Natalie Mast, Director of ADWR’s Active Management division, outlining groundwater management options – can be found here.

Mitchell’s presentation included data depicting long-term changes in the Willcox basin. The Department’s regional groundwater flow model of the basin showed that as much as 400 feet of drawdown has occurred between 1940 – a period viewed as “pre-development” of the area – and 2015, representing the most recent full data set. 

Within that 75-year period, an estimated 5.7 million acre-feet of groundwater has been mined from storage in the basin, observed Mitchell. 

By comparison, that amount of groundwater extracted from that single basin in southeastern Arizona is comparable to two full years of Arizona’s annual Colorado River allocation of 2.8 million acre-feet.

“If all pumping stopped today, it would take over 280 years for the aquifer to recover,” noted Mitchell.

Surface levels of the Willcox Basin, meanwhile, have dropped as much as 11.5 feet since 1969, said Mitchell, resulting among other impacts in “fissuring,” which causes stress fracturing on the surface that can create chasms dozens of feet deep, often running for several miles.

In terms of severity of decline, the Willcox Basin is among the three most seriously jeopardized groundwater basins in the state, along with the Gila Bend Basin southwest of Phoenix and the Ranegras Plain Basin in western Arizona. 

All three basins are in areas outside of the regulatory authority that exists within the active management areas created by the 1980 Groundwater Management Act.

AMA Director Natalie Mast then outlined possible groundwater management options.

The presentation included a depiction of the two main management structures – Active Management Areas and Irrigation Non-expansion Areas. Currently, there are six AMAs throughout the state, as well as three INAs. AMAs require water providers to have an assured water supply for their home owners, and that communities create and abide by conservation goals and other requirements. INAs require some but not all of the consumer protections of AMAs.

Mast described for the audience the processes for creating a management structure, which may be the result of a majority vote for an AMA or a decision by the ADWR Director to create either an INA or AMA.

At the Willcox meeting, Mast emphasized that the purpose of the ADWR presentations was informational only.

“I would not want to speculate on what sort of legislation may follow. There is a lot of customization that is available through that process,” she said.

Several attendees took the opportunity to give voice to their views following the ADWR presentations. ADWR plans to address many of the questions and issues raised at the public meeting in a “Frequently Asked Questions” document to be published on the ADWR website ( azwater.gov )

Sunsites resident Steve Kisiel said he was forced to deepen his residential well in 2012. “My neighbors all have had to deepen their wells,” he said. “I have neighbors who have not been able to deepen wells and are hauling water.”

Mark Jorve, who said he moved to the Willcox area 15 years ago to “be part of the wine industry,” said the water table has dropped 100 feet in that time.

“Folks, I do not think that that’s okay,” he said. “This time, we really need to take care of it.”

Ray Ihly, who owns a ranch in Dragoon, spoke in favor of rainwater harvesting as an option to drilling wells for groundwater extraction.

“If you can do rainwater harvesting, why do you even need a well?” he asked.

State Representative Gail Griffin, whose district includes Willcox, described the Legislature’s on-going efforts to finds solutions to the groundwater issues facing the region.

She said management options under consideration by lawmakers can give “additional tools and results in real, significant long-term benefits.” Rep. Griffin noted that the groundwater meeting was competing that evening with the Cochise County Fair and a political candidates forum in Sunsites. 

She thanked them for choosing the ADWR presentations and added that she was “here listening” to her constituents.