Regulator to see deluge of water pipeline input

Nevada's top water regulator is about to see his inbox explode.

Conservation groups and other opponents of the Southern Nevada Water Authority's plans to siphon groundwater from across eastern Nevada are preparing to bury State Engineer Jason King in negative public input on the project.

The Center for Biological Diversity alone plans to submit roughly 21,000 comments from its members across the country -- so many that the environmental group has collected them on a DVD it plans to send to King by Friday's deadline for written comment.

An additional 2,000 letters opposing the pipeline project will be delivered to King this week from Southern Nevada residents.

Launce Rake from the anti-pipeline group Great Basin Water Network said one of the letters is from Clark County Commissioner Chris Giunchigliani, who previously served on the water authority board.

A message left for Giunchigliani was not immediately returned.

Rake was one of several water authority critics who held a news conference Monday to tout local opposition to the pipeline and encourage more people to send letters to the state engineer.

The authority has requested state permission to tap up to 126,000 acre-feet of groundwater a year from four valleys in Lincoln and White Pine counties and pump it to Las Vegas through a multibillion-dollar pipeline that would stretch more than 300 miles and supply as many as 450,000 homes.

It will be up to King to decide how much water, if any, the authority should be allowed to withdraw. His decision is expected by the end of March.

King already has plenty of reading to do. His office just wrapped up a hearing on the authority's groundwater applications that included six weeks of testimony from 82 witnesses and tens of thousands of pages of documents.

The Las Vegas Valley currently gets 90 percent of its water from the Colorado River by way of Lake Mead. Authority officials insist the community needs a back-up supply and the pipeline can be developed without harming the environment.

The groundwater applications now under consideration were originally submitted by the Las Vegas Valley Water District as part of a mass filing in 1989, two years before the authority was formed to serve as the region's wholesale water supplier.

Monday's news conference was held in a parking lot on Main Street, within sight of the water authority's downtown headquarters.

"I make the argument all the time that we don't need this water. We have a safe, reliable source of water in the Colorado River if we use it wisely," Rake said over the din of tour helicopters and traffic on the nearby street.

He and others said the project threatens to ravage the environment and cost upwards of $15 billion, a price that will be paid by water customers and other taxpayers.

"In such tough economic times, it's outrageous that such a boondoggle would go forward," said Marie Logan, Nevada organizer for the national advocacy group Food & Water Watch.

Added state Assemblyman Joe Hogan, D-Las Vegas: "We hate to see our precious resources diverted to something that's going to cause more problems than it solves."

Small-business owner Heather Fisher came to the press conference with her 3-month-old daughter, Sequoia. She and her husband started their bicycle and outdoor adventure tour company 20 years ago, and they don't see the point in paying higher taxes and water bills for a project that could devastate some of the wild places where they take their clients, she said.

"We have to look to the future instead of a 25-year-old plan that maybe doesn't apply today," Fisher said.

The pipeline project has the support of the cities of Las Vegas, Henderson and North Las Vegas, the Las Vegas Chamber of Commerce, the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority, and numerous gaming, construction and labor organizations.

In the end, though, public input will take a back seat to the real backbone of the case, said water authority spokesman J.C. Davis.

"I think it's good that people are being given the opportunity to comment," he said, "but ultimately the state engineer makes his decision based on science and the law."

The Nevada Division of Water Resources will accept written public input on the Southern Nevada Water Authority's groundwater project until 5 p.m. Friday.

Comments should be addressed to Susan Joseph-Taylor, Chief Hearing Officer, Office of the State Engineer, 901 S. Stewart St., Suite 2002, Carson City, NV 89701.

The state engineer will not consider any email submissions.

Pipeline opponents set up an email account, greeninvegas@gmail.com, about a month ago to collect comments on the project.

Logan said any emails sent to that address by Wednesday afternoon will be printed out and delivered to Carson City by Friday's deadline.

Contact reporter Henry Brean at hbrean@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0350.