Water Authority considers Coyote Springs proposal

Wednesday, Nov. 17, 2004 | 10:46 a.m.

The board of the Southern Nevada Water Authority could approve an agreement Thursday with the federal government that would allow the agency to pump water from the Coyote Springs area of northern Clark County and southern Lincoln County.

The agreement, however, comes over the objections of the national environmental group Defenders of Wildlife, one of several organizations that are vigorously protesting the water authority's plans to draw water from rural parts of Nevada.

Brian Segee, counsel for Defenders of Wildlife, said the memorandum of agreement between the water authority, U.S. Fish and Wildlife, the developer Coyote Springs Investment, the federal Bureau of Land Management and other players was drafted out of the public eye and threatens the survival of the Moapa dace, a species of small fish unique to streams such as the Muddy River in Southern Nevada.

Pat Mulroy, Water Authority general manager, said the agreement calls for the Southern Nevada agency to spend $1.25 million to ensure that the fish is not threatened by the new pumping.

"We will protect the dace," she said Monday.

About 93 percent of the 1,000 or so remaining Moapa dace, which can grow to be about 3 inches, are located in the Moapa Valley National Wildlife Refuge.

Segee said groundwater pumping already occurring in Arrow Canyon north of the wildlife refuge is having an impact on the Moapa dace, and further pumping in Coyote Springs will further endanger the surviving fish.

He cited a June 1 letter from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Services to Nevada State Engineer Hugh Ricci that said the agency "has concluded that the increase in pumping at the Arrow Canyon Well since 1998 has caused measurable responses over a large area. Groundwater levels and spring discharge in the Muddy River springs area and Coyote Springs Valley started to decline precipitously in 1998."

The Fish and Wildlife letter said "continued pumping will adversely impact the endangered Moapa dace and other species on the refuge." Despite the agency's concerns, however, Fish and Wildlife concluded its discussions earlier this month and produced the agreement which would allow more pumping.

Bob Williams, state director of the federal agency, said the goal of the agreement is to generate more information on both the water resources and the Moapa dace.

"While there's existing information from Arrow Canyon, the whole ground water issue and how much can be extracted without jeopardizing of causing the species to become extinct is unknown," Williams said.

The agreement provides for "cooperative testing without jeopardizing the species."

"One of the areas that we need to know is the specific needs of the species," he said.

The premise is to go slowly, Williams said.

"In a year or two, we hope to have some answers," he said. "We'll be in a much better position to say more about the species, more about the needs of the species.

"If we see a problem, we can stop."

Defenders of Wildlife, however, sees a problem now.

Segee said his group would consider legal action to bar the pumping if the agreement, as appears likely, is approved. He said the proposed pumping of about 4,500 acre-feet a year from Coyote Springs would quadruple the amount that is being taken now from Arrow Canyon.

The pumping at Arrow Canyon is in itself a test, and Segee said the testing must be completed and evaluated for the impact on the Moapa dace before other work can continue.

In a letter to Fish and Wildlife Service, the environmental group promised to "vigorously pursue judicial remedies" to block the pumping and associated pipeline construction planned by the Water Authority.

Mulroy said the pumping proposed for Coyote Springs would determine how much water can be taken without impacting the Moapa dace and the Muddy River.

"The pumping will allow us to do what the state engineer wants us to do, which is test pump Coyote Springs," Mulroy said. "All that is out there, we won't know until we pump.

"Under the agreement, the dace are protected. I always shake my head in disbelief when people don't even want to do the necessary research."

While flows from regional springs to the Muddy River have gone down, she said it is unclear whether that is because of pumping by the Moapa Valley Water District, a regional supplier in northeast Clark County, or the five-year drought which has impacted water supplies throughout the West.

The agreement would allow the water authority to pump about half of the 9,000 acre-feet a year the agency plans to draw from Coyote Springs, Mulroy said. One acre-foot of water, about 326,000 gallons, is about enough water for 1.5 typical families to live on for a year.

The effort is part of its larger plan to draw water from rural areas, including the Muddy and Virgin rivers and vast spaces of Lincoln and White Pine counties, the has engendered resistance from environmental groups.

The water authority says it needs the water to supplement its supply from the drought-threatened Colorado River. Eventually, the rural water supplies could almost double the amount of water available for Las Vegas -- and provide enough water for Las Vegas to grow to a population of 3 million or more.