Stop Las Vegas Water Grab

We oppose the Southern Nevada Water Authoritys (SNWA) Groundwater Development Plan! This is an unjust, ill conceived plan that is designed to benefit urban Las Vegas to the detriment of the Western Shoshone Nation and rural Nevadans. The Plan would affect water within the boundaries of Western Shoshone territory and is a violation of the 1863 Treaty of Ruby Valley.

In purely technical terms, to pump 200,000 acre feet of water (over 65 billion gallons) annually through a 300 mile, 7 foot wide pipeline would cause the depletion of Nevadas Great Basin aquifer. Renowned scientists have strongly warned that this would have a devastating effect:

Dr. Jim Deacon, a UNLV biologist and top researcher on desert biology stated that there would be a noticeable decline in the groundwater table extending approximately from Death Valley, California to Sevier Lake, Utah. The groundwater draw down from Indian Springs to Bakers, Nevada could exceed 50 feet, dropping as low as 1600 feet.

Dr. Martin Mifflin, a hydrologist that has studied Nevada ground water for over 50 years, along with many other experts, suspect that Nevadas groundwater basins are connected at some level far below the surface.

Western Shoshone elders in the past and the present confirm what the scientists are saying. Shoshone creation stories stem from the Great Basin area and the Shoshone state that all the waters are connected. According to Shoshone teachings, the water underneath the ground attracts the moisture above the ground meaning that with the depletion of underground water there will be lower and lower rainfall amounts, crippling already drought-ridden areas. A removal of water like the one proposed in the SNWAs Plan would devastate the semi-arid desert area and threaten the existence of our plants and animals including 20 listed endangered species and 137 native species restricted to springs and wetlands.

SNWA officials claim that the siphoning of water will not have a negative impact. However, when farming conglomerates began pumping water at Ash Meadows, NV, Devils Hole with its endangered Pup Fish was nearly drained until the Supreme Court ordered an end to the pumping. At Owens Valley, California, regardless of assurances by authorities, Owens Lake disappeared; turning Owens Valley into a desert after a similar massive pipeline project was allowed to supply the City of Los Angeles with water.

Nevadas indigenous communities, as well as other small communities, ranchers and farmers are already increasingly faced with drying wells, believed to be caused partially by climate change in the form of decreased mountain snow and rain fall, as well as by intensive agriculture and massive water use by ever expanding, large-scale mining. In the SNWA plan there has been NO mention made to assess water wasted by the mining industry.

We are also alarmed and highly concerned with the future prospect of 2 new coal power plants in our backyards which would provide the energy to power the pipeline. We will lose our water and instead be given toxic air.

No is No! Do not turn Nevada into a wasteland! We urge the Nevada State Water Engineer and SNWA to immediately put a stop to this unrealistic plan that is threatening not only our way of life, but the entire Nevadan landscape.