--------------------------------

1. Arizonans must do more to protect San Pedro, Babbitt says

Wednesday, November 10, 1999

By Bill Hess

The Sierra Vista Herald

BISBEE - Arizona has to do more to protect the San Pedro River, including establishing an active management area, otherwise the waterway's salvation will be administered by federal courts, Secretary of the Interior Bruce Babbitt warned this morning. While he praised the growing effort between the United States and Mexico to find solutions to the San Pedro River problems, Babbitt said as far as people living along the waterway in Arizona, We are not doing enough to meet our obligation. We are clearly falling further behind.

That comment brought applause from the nearly 50 people attending the last day of the binational San Pedro Conference. The first half of the four-day event was held in Mexico. A passionate supporter of preserving the river in both countries, Babbitt said it would be a shame if the last free-flowing waterway in Arizona went dry. That has already happened to the Gila River, which no longer flows to the sea, he said. And then there is the Santa Cruz River, which is bone dry most of the year, destroyed by thoughtless development.

When he was Arizona's attorney general and governor, he saw the saving of the San Pedro as critical to the area's environment. After leaving the governors office and going back into law practice and finally becoming the interior secretary, Babbitt said he has always kept an interest in the river.

The integrity of the San Pedro River is important, he said. Babbitt said people who live in the San Pedro Valley of Arizona have to be applauded for their efforts they have made and are trying to make. Specifically, he called the city of Sierra Vistas proposed effluent recharge project an impressive step.

He also noted after his speech that the recently signed biological opinion agreement between Fort Huachuca and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service also will help. However, Babbitt said, There's still more to do, which means the fort has to assume additional responsibility in the Upper San Pedro River Basin.

It will mean supporting the idea of creating an active management area that exists in four other areas of the state, he said. It will take federal, state and local agencies to create the special areas, but the most important part will be the state government's involvement. Water consumption on the Arizona side of the basin has to be reduced, Babbitt said. He noted the areas per capita water use is more than Phoenix, and I say that in the most negative way.

What bothered him was learning there has been an increase in agricultural pumping in the Arizona part of the basin. That is unimaginable abuse of this resource. We cannot allow this to continue, Babbitt said.

Without a mechanism that brings together local governments and developers, there will be no effective management of water on the Arizona side of the border, he said. One possibility is to expand the Upper San Pedro Partnership, made up of federal, state and local agencies, to include other groups.

Again, he returned to what was the major point in his speech that is the state has to become more involved. Raise your voices and ask, Where is the state of Arizona? Babbitt demanded.

With proper management, reasonable growth and jobs will come to the San Pedro Valley, Babbitt said. There is a desire on both sides of the border to protect the river, he said. It was his counterpart in Mexico, Julia Carabias, who said more than a year ago it was time to find an area along the border that both countries could work together to protect, he said.

Looking at a map of the border region from California to Texas, the San Pedro River area popped up, Babbitt said. The river on both sides of the border is where the future is, where there is still time, he said. But he warned, the life of the river is in its 11th hour. There still is some time to save it.

--------------------------------

2. San Pedro management in danger, Babbitt says

Thursday, November 11, 1999

By Ignacio Ibarra

The Arizona Daily Star

BISBEE - If local and state officials continue to allow growth to sip away the San Pedro River, the federal government will work to take its management out of their hands, Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt said yesterday.

"We are clearly falling further behind, and we are in danger of losing the opportunity to manage the Arizona San Pedro in a way that meets our stewardship obligations," Babbitt said. Babbitt made his comments to about 100 scientists, resource managers, local leaders and water users attending a binational conference on the San Pedro.

Babbitt said it is his responsibility as Interior secretary to advocate and defend the river, "and ultimately, to take the legal steps that are necessary in the Congress and the federal courts to make certain that we don't repeat the mistakes of the past and that we do protect this extraordinary piece of God's creation."

About 400 bird species - representing more than half the nesting species in the United States - call the San Pedro Riparian Conservation Area home for at least part of the year. Dozens of endangered animal and plant species live in the river valley.

But river users on both sides of the border are depleting the watershed by about 7,000 acre-feet more than it is being replenished. An acre-foot is 326,000 gallons of water - a year's worth for a family of four.

Babbitt, a former Arizona attorney general and governor, said the state has "abdicated its responsibility to lead in the management of this resource."

He praised the growing cooperation between the United States and Mexico, as well as the local efforts to find solutions to the river's problems. He cited Sierra Vista's planned effluent recharge system as an "impressive step, but it isn't enough" to make up for what he called an unsustainable level of per-capita water consumption in the San Pedro River Valley.

Babbitt decried recent agricultural expansion along the San Pedro in Cochise County, calling it "an unimaginable abuse of the resource." He said there is room for growth and job creation in the San Pedro River Valley, "but we don't have to do it by destroying the very resource that draws so many people here . . . by destroying the very values that make this such a unique place on this planet."

Babbitt said after his speech that Arizona and others involved in the river must develop some type of legal framework for management. He noted that management areas are in place in Tucson, Phoenix and Prescott and along the Santa Cruz River. He said if that is not done, "eventually we resort to the federal courts and the possibility of the judicial administration of the water in this basin."

Babbitt said protection of the river will be helped by a biological opinion and agreement announced late last month between Fort Huachuca and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. He said that the fort has taken strong steps to reduce water consumption, but must now take a more active role in supporting the management of the San Pedro River.

Babbitt spoke in English and Spanish to the crowd gathered for "Divided Waters, Common Ground," a four-day conference on the San Pedro watershed that ended yesterday.

--------------------------------

3. People on both sides of the border must come together

Saturday, November 13, 1999

By Bill Hess

The Sierra Vista Herald

BISBEE - The San Pedro River Basin water woes will not be solved until the average citizen in both Arizona and Sonora are heard, said a top environmental investigator. Andres Villarreal Lizarraga, who works for the Sonoran Institute for Sustainable Development and Environment, said bringing together the common citizen of both countries will mean those in Mexico will have to first become more knowledgeable about the river.

In Mexico, there is a wariness of scientists and government officials by the citizens, who see both groups as autocratic, he said during a break in Wednesdays San Pedro Conference. The four-day event was held in the United States and Mexico and was sponsored by the Semi-Arid Land-Surface-Atmosphere Program. Villarreal said there are growing grassroots environmental groups in Mexico, but they are no where the level of sophistication of similar organizations in the United States. There is a desire to have a voice but they don't know how to go about it, he said. He described the organization he is with a something between a public agency and a private group. Developing citizens environmental groups is difficult in Mexico, Villarreal said.

Ghani Chehbouni agrees. A French scientist, who has worked in Mexico for four years and is part of the SALSA Program, said the environmental community in the United States is well ahead of what exists in Mexico. As an example people in Mexico cannot believe environmental groups would have the power to cause Fort Huachuca to close, Chehbouni said. That would be like groups in Mexico forcing the mine operation in Cananea to shut down to protect the environment. That is something they don't believe could happen, he said. It was difficult for him and other scientist trying to gather information in Mexico to gain the trust of the people at first, Chehbouni said. They saw us as another part of the federal (Mexican) government which they do not trust. Gradually that has changed with the understanding that the scientists are trying to look out for the peoples interests, he said.

Economics is the major concern in Mexico. People have decided how much they are willing to give up to protect the environment. If they can protect the environment and make a good living, they will. If they have to surrender making a living to protect the environment, they will not, Chehbouni said.

Hopefully one day, without either state or federal government influence from the United States or Mexico, average Arizonans and Sonorans who share the San Pedro River will be able to meet to discuss how they would like to see both the environment and economic securities maintained, Villarreal said. He suggested that a good place to meet would be in a border community in the San Pedro River Basin which shares the same name Naco, Arizona and Naco, Sonora.

Ann Moote, of the Udall Center for Studies in Public Policy, said the Tucson-based organization has worked with citizens on the Arizona side of the border concerning the San Pedro River and has expanded its efforts into Mexico. Within a year she said she hopes to be able to establish a joint meeting but first, We have to now work with the people in Sonora to help them feel comfortable. Villarreal said until the citizens, not the governments or the scientists, find common ground the problems of the San Pedro River Basin both countries will not be solved.

--------------------------------

4. Need for area water manager up for debate

Monday, November 15, 1999

By Bill Hess

The Sierra Vista Herald

BISBEE - Must there be a water manager for the Upper San Pedro River Basin? Many believe yes is the answer. But what kind of manager and what kind of power is needed is open to debate.

On Wednesday, Judy Gignac, general manager of the Bella Vista Water Company, told the nearly 150 people who attended the last day of the San Pedro Conference that a few years ago she was part of a group seeking some kind of organization that would help control water use in the basin. The ideas of the Water Issues Group were soundly defeated by a strong consortium of anti-control organizations. Gignac said U.S. Secretary of Interior Bruce Babbitt's idea that the area needs an active management area will not do the job because such an arrangement only addresses ground water.

Wednesday morning, Babbitt, a former Arizona attorney general and governor and longtime supporter of protecting the river, said the state must do more, which includes creating an active management area. He held out no velvet glove as he spoke about his views of the need to do more to protect the river and the area's water. Babbitt said if the state and local people do not create some kind of mechanism to control the deficit, the federal government will. Those steps could be to go before Congress to seek special authority to take over the regions water programs or to take the issue to the federal courts for a judicial ruling to do the same thing, Babbitt said.

A recently signed biological opinion agreement requires Fort Huachuca and U.S. Fish and Wildlife officials to encourage the creation of a regional water manager by using the Upper San Pedro Partnership as the avenue to establish the position. Maj. Gen. John D. Thomas Jr., commander of the fort, said he and Fish and Wildlife Service officials can only suggest, not require, the creation of a water manager.

The Upper San Pedro Partnership, of which the fort is a member, is made up of a number of federal, state and local government agencies and other groups such as The Nature Conservancy. After her comments to the group Wednesday, Gignac re-emphasized that an active management area will not work, but there are ways to modify it to meet the local concerns.

Sierra Vista Mayor Tom Hessler said whatever is done should be accomplished slowly and carefully, noting the city is open to suggestions. Sierra Vista Councilman Bob Strain said he has no doubts that some kind of system to manage the areas water will have to be established once it is decided by all the members of the Upper San Pedro Partnership what type of controls will be best for the basin.

Tombstone Mayor Bill Brett said his community is not a member of the partnership yet. Because decisions will be made concerning water throughout the basin, and that includes the future status of the pipeline from the Huachuca Mountains to Tombstone, Brett said he will recommend to the Common Council that Tombstone joins the partnership. We need to be a member, if we want to have a voice, he said.

--------------------------------

5. Babbitt speaks at conference on San Pedro Basin

Wednesday, November 17, 1999

By Chris Dabovich

The San Pedro Valley News­Sun

Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt, at a bi-national conference on the San Pedro River last week, stressed that local and state officials should get a better handle on growth management along the San Pedro River or risk turning that management over to the federal government.

Babbitt, the former Arizona governor and attorney general, addressed some 100 scientists, water users, local leaders and resource managers at last week's conference. The final day, held at the Bisbee Convention Center, capped four days of discussions. Babbitt spoke in English and Spanish on the perils that could potentially face the San Pedro River as growth continues especially in Cochise County.

Portions along the river are designated National Riparian Conservation Areas. About 400 bird species nest along the river at some time or another. Additionally, the river is habitat to an array of endangered and animal plant species.

And while Babbitt praised growing cooperation between local, Mexican and American counterparts in seeking solutions to help ease depletion of the aquifer, he chastised recent agricultural expansion along the San Pedro in Cochise County. According to published reports, the watershed is depleted by about 7,000 acre-feet more than is being replenished.

Babbitt said room for growth exists but it should not be done at the expense of the river. "We don't have to do it by destroying the very resource that draws so many people here," Babbitt said.

He noted it's his duty to address the depleting watershed situation and to "take legal steps that are necessary in the Congress and federal courts to make certain we don't repeat the mistakes of the past and that we protect this extraordinary piece of God's creation." Babbitt also stressed some type of legal management framework must be devised and noted those systems are in place along the Santa Cruz River, in Tucson, Prescott and Phoenix.

He warned if steps are not taken, the issue could go before federal courts where a judicial administration could control use of the water in the basin. Babbitt praised the city of Sierra Vista's planned effluent recharge system but said water use along the river valley is currently at an unsustainable level of consumption.

-----------------------------------------------

6. U.S. water users long for a part of Mexican supply

Sunday, November 28, 1999

By Ignacio Ibarra

The Arizona Daily Star

CANANEA, Sonora - As major water users on the U.S. side of the San Pedro River basin scramble to find ways to balance their water budget, they are increasingly looking to the Mexican headwaters to make up the shortfall. But water users on the Mexican side of the river's watershed are having their own problems meeting the growing demand for water, and say they don't intend to stop raising cattle and growing alfalfa simply to ensure that Sierra Vista can grow more subdivisions.

A report prepared last year by the multinational Commission for Environmental Cooperation estimated agriculture in the region uses about 16,000 acre-feet of water per year. It determined that eliminating irrigation on the Mexican side of the San Pedro River Valley would save nearly 14,000 acre-feet per year and could restore streamside willow and cottonwood forests and cause stream flows to increase. The commission estimated that irrigation on the U.S. side would use only about 1,100 acre-feet next year.

Sierra Vista group's wish list

The report said that of all the options examined by an international team of experts, eliminating agriculture in Mexico "provides the greatest hydrologic benefit." The Upper San Pedro Partnership, an organization of government agencies and public and private water users in the Sierra Vista area, last year included cutting agricultural activity south of the border in a list of proposed water-conservation policies and projects.

Cananea Mayor Francisco Garcia Gamez said he recognizes the need to protect and preserve the San Pedro River, but like community leaders in Sierra Vista, he also is concerned about ensuring sufficient water for his community. "We cannot have limitations." And if he has to choose between the river and the future of his community, it won't be Cananea that dries up and disappears. "My big concern is that if Cananea is to grow in terms of industry, and that is what we are proposing, we cannot have limitations on the extraction of ground water from the basin," said Garcia. "Obviously, water is becoming increasingly scarce everywhere, so we are working to develop a culture of conservation," Garcia said. "But the effort is for our own benefit - Sierra Vista will have to find its own way to survive. I'm looking out for my own people. That's my concern."

He said water use by the 35,000 residents here is about 160 gallons per person per day, about the same as the per-capita consumption in Sierra Vista, Cananea's sister city of about 45,000. He's hopeful that through public education and conservation efforts, the city can cut that level in half. He said the biggest problem facing his community isn't the demise of the river but the use of ground water by the town's major employer, Mexicana de Cananea. The mining company's pumping has resulted in a decline in ground water levels that has led to severe water shortages and occasional outages during the dry seasons in recent years.

Farmers and ranchers say ground water use by the mine has dropped the water table, rendering some of their wells unusable and increasing the cost of pumping where water is available.

Copper company says it's cutting back

Copper company officials, speaking at an international conference on the San Pedro held in Cananea and Bisbee earlier this month, said they are steadily reducing the use of ground water in their mining and ore-processing operations. But they acknowledged that they are currently pumping about 12,500 acre-feet per year from the San Pedro River basin, more than the city of Sierra Vista, Fort Huachuca and all human consumption on the U.S. side of the river combined.

Manuel Contreras, a geologist for Mexicana de Cananea, said 84 percent of the water used at the plant is recycled waste water from the mine. But at any given moment, 15 to 20 of the mine's approximately 50 wells are pumping water from the San Pedro basin to the mining operation. The mine uses water for ore concentration and other copper-processing activities, as well as dust suppression. Earlier this year, Mexicana de Cananea hired an outside consultant to conduct an extensive study of the San Pedro aquifer. The objective of the $200,000 study, due to be completed next year, is to assess the availability of ground water.

Opposition at communal farm

But city officials and water users like Jose Manuel Barcelo, president of the ejido Emiliano Zapata, about eight miles east of Cananea, said the company is hoping to use the study to support its assertion that it is not responsible for the water woes the area faces. Ejidos are government-established communal farms. "They want us to believe that their pumping doesn't affect us, but I can see the difference in the amount of water our wells can pump when (the mining company) turns on their wells near here," Barcelo said. "It's a problem for us, but the situation is worse farther north at Morelos and San Pedro."

Barcelo and other ranchers here said they support the effort to preserve the San Pedro River and will consider limiting farming and ranching if they are assured adequate compensation. But they say working the land here is more than a business or a source of income - it is a lifestyle they want to pass on to their children.

Watching helplessly

Manuel Esquer Villa, the president of the ejido at Morelos, a few miles south of the border, said he and other cooperative members have been raising cattle and providing beef and produce for themselves and other communities in the region for more than 40 years. But recently they've watched helplessly as drought has withered grazing lands in the last seven years; water levels in 21 wells on the ejido continue to drop year after year. He said no one understands the problem more than someone who depends on the land for his livelihood.

"We understand the situation very well, and we are disposed to working with everyone involved to search for ways we can cooperate and establish a level of equilibrium with the river," said Esquer. "We are left with a choice of having nothing or having something, and something is always preferable."

Hector M. Arias, of the Cabinet of Environmental Studies, an Hermosillo, Sonora-based environmental research group, said he thinks the potential benefit of eliminating agriculture in the region has been overstated. The reason: agriculture in the region consists mainly of ranching, which is not an intensive water-use activity. In addition, agriculture here is experiencing a serious economic slump worsened by the growing cost of pumping ground water and maintaining wells. Although there has been an overall increase in agricultural activity in Mexico over the last 25 years, Arias said huge tracts of land have gone out of production recently. "If you look at the some of the (satellite) images, you can see how the land use has changed. On the contrary, in the United States, there has been an exaggerated increase in the area being irrigated, particularly at Benson and St. David," he said.

Manuela Casselmann, a sociologist and doctoral student at the educational geography department of Johan Wolfgang Goethe University in Frankfurt, Germany, has been studying the cultural and social aspects of the San Pedro River issue on U.S. and Mexican citizens living and working in the watershed. She said there are significant differences in the way each side views the problems. "There are different issues that come together," she said. "The physical need to survive, to keep a farm to make a living, is much different than the need for a conservation area to go to and to do some bird watching. The challenging thing is not to give up on the idea of the possibility to sustain the habitat for bird species, and at the same time to sustain the home of a group of people."

-----------------------------------------------

7. Eye on the troubled San Pedro: Ecosystems in transition, international team finds

Sunday, November 28, 1999

By Ignacio Ibarra

The Arizona Daily Star

SIERRA VISTA - Some of the ways humankind has depleted the San Pedro River are obvious: a mine, a housing development, a military base. It's up to an international group of scientists to piece together the more subtle ways in which the ecosystems of the San Pedro River Valley give and take from this rare ribbon of desert water on which these developments depend.

After five years of ongoing research, it's clear that surface flows in the upper San Pedro basin are threatened by more than just mining, agriculture and urban growth. Arizona's last free-flowing desert river also is being harmed by a changing balance in the valley's plant life triggered by grazing and drought: Grasslands that encourage recharge are giving way to less beneficial mesquite brush.

The research, conducted by scientists from the United States, France, Mexico and other nations through the Semi-Arid Land Surface Atmosphere program - known as SALSA - has focused on understanding the hydrology of the river and its interrelationship with plant and animal life. That includes humans, an array of endangered species and about a third of the United States' bird species.

Dramatic changes since 1973

Dr. A. Ghani Chehbouni, a hydrologist with France's Institute for Research and Development, examined satellite images taken in 1973, 1986, 1992 and 1997 and discovered dramatic differences in the land use and vegetative cover in the Upper San Pedro basin - particularly the portion in northern Sonora. The surface of the river basin area covered by mesquite woodland increased almost 400 percent between 1973 and 1997, according to Holly Richter of the Nature Conservancy. At the same time, grassland and desert scrublands have declined significantly.

Chehbouni said overgrazing and long-term drought have transformed the U.S. portion of the river basin and now threaten the southern end of the aquifer as well. Chehbouni said the conversion of grassland to mesquite shrub represents a threat to the San Pedro because the grasslands help slow the runoff of rainwater during floods, helping to hold soils in place and promote ground water recharge.

"Frankly, the process that happened in the U.S. in the last century and the beginning of this century is actually happening (now) on the Mexican part of the basin. Mainly, the destruction of the riparian zone, and the invasion of grassland by the mesquite," Chehbouni said. Grasses survive on the moisture contained in the first few inches of soil, unlike mesquite, which can switch from shallow feeder roots that compete directly with grasses to deep taproots that make them more likely to survive in periods of drought.

Bill Childress, project manager for the Bureau of Land Management's San Pedro Riparian Conservation Area, said much of the improvement of the habitat within the federally owned portion of the river is due to the elimination of agricultural irrigation and cattle grazing within its boundaries. Without cattle, the grasslands have come back. But the 15-year moratorium on such uses within the 43-mile-long conservation area is set to expire in 2003; it's up to the Bureau of Land Management to decide whether to extend it.

The lessons SALSA scientists are learning eventually will provide water managers in the United States and Mexico with better tools with which to manage the resource, said David Goodrich, a hydrologist with the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Agricultural Research Center.

A meeting sponsored by SALSA participants in Bisbee and Cananea, Sonora, earlier this month brought together scientists, government agencies and local water users from the United States and Mexico. "I think we're making a positive contribution," said Goodrich. "We learn incrementally. . . . There is still a lot we don't know." Among the important questions is whether planned recharge efforts actually will benefit the river.

Goodrich said even a seemingly benign effort such as the recent reintroduction of beavers on the San Pedro raises questions that can be answered only by further study. Without research, he said, there is no way to determine whether the beavers help reduce water use by cutting down saplings, or if any water savings are offset by increased evaporation from ponds backed up by beaver dams. "My own feeling is that before a lot of money is spent, some pilot projects need to be done with adequate monitoring to see the effects," said Goodrich. "But that doesn't mean you can't start some of the work."

Cottonwood-willow forest's water use

The scientists have learned, among other things, that the cottonwood-willow forest along the San Pedro River may use less water than predicted by current water-use models for the river. Goodrich said researchers also are learning that the water runoff events during the summer rainy season may also be more important than originally thought.

In the Sierra Vista subwatershed, ground water pumping has created a "cone of depression" near the river that is believed to affect the surface flow of the San Pedro. The most serious problem is thought to be near Fort Huachuca and Sierra Vista, where ground water levels have dropped 20 to 90 feet, according to a 1996 report by the Arizona Department of Water Resources.

Many studies, including a report prepared last year by a panel of experts assembled by the Commission for Environmental Cooperation, have concluded that the amount of water extracted from the San Pedro River basin exceeds the amount recharged naturally by about 7,000 acre-feet per year.

Don Pool, a hydrologist with the U.S. Geological Survey who spoke at the SALSA meeting earlier this month, said the cone of depression is growing. "It's reaching out farther and farther, and capturing more recharge water," Pool said. "And as it grows and expands it will affect areas further and further south of the cone of depression and it will also affect the Babocomari River," which joins the San Pedro just north of Huachuca City. "The Babocomari right now flows at about 1 cubic foot per second - that's pretty low flow, so it wouldn't take much to totally dry that river." Other SALSA research has been aimed at answering the question of how much water the riparian vegetation uses and where the water comes from.

Big trees use over 100 gallons a day

Dr. David Williams of the University of Arizona's Department of Renewable Natural Resources and his colleagues have implanted instruments in cottonwoods and willow trees along the San Pedro to measure the amount of fluids moving through them. They found that the largest trees use more than 100 gallons of water per day. But the research showed the denser growths of young trees in the primary stream channel use far more water overall than the larger trees in secondary stream channels.

Williams traced the movement of naturally occurring hydrogen and oxygen isotopes in the water to determine whether plants were harvesting moisture from the soil or from the ground water in the river channel aquifer. The research showed that hackberry, ash and mesquite draw the bulk of their water from the surface soil, while willow and cottonwood use water from deeper ground water sources. "This is very important information when you try to determine the hydrologic balance of a system," said Williams.

The implications of the research could be significant for the Sierra Vista subwatershed, Goodrich said. He estimates that the amount of water consumed by plant life along the river may be 5 percent less than previously thought. "If those numbers hold up, it goes a way toward bringing a closer balance to the system," he said.

International team

The San Pedro has drawn an international team of scientists because the river is an excellent example of one in a semiarid region, one of the fastest-growing biological zones in the world. In more than 20 countries, human demand for water has exceeded the natural supply, resulting in water shortages and a gradual transformation to desert. The desertification of semiarid and dry land regions affects nearly one-sixth of the world's population and 30 percent of its land surface.