Posted: January 15, 2010     Author: Ruppert Steele, Brian Moench, and Terry Marasco

10 reasons not to give Utah water to Nevada

10 REASONS NOT TO GIVE UTAH WATER TO NEVADA.

Utah's tourism slogan is "Life Elevated." Perfect irony, because what is most elevated in Utah is our air pollution -- the worst in the country this week and hardly a boon to tourism.

But it could be worse. In fact, if Gov. Gary Herbert gives away Snake Valley water to Nevada, it will be. To continue massaging the fine print of the proposed agreement between the two states is like arguing over what tunes to play while the Titanic sinks. We offer 10 reality checks:

1. Any agreement will siphon enormous volumes of water from Snake Valley to support land speculators and casino operators in Las Vegas. Over 70 years, the water Utah surrenders to be piped to Southern Nevada would fill an acre-square skyscraper 471 miles high.

2. "Possession is 90 percent of the law." Once Nevada has invested millions to make hundreds of thousands of people dependent on that water, no court will turn off the tap, regardless of the agreement, or whether Snake Valley has become a ghost town, or how much wind-blown dust covers Temple Square. The saga of the notorious William Mulholland stealing Owens Valley water for Los Angeles is exactly what Utah can expect to see repeated.

3. Why would Herbert cooperate and why has our entire congressional delegation deserted us? Investigative journalists from the Las Vegas Sun, The Los Angeles Times and Bloomberg News reveal that Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., has mixed a stew of blackmail, quid pro quo and old-fashioned influence peddling, threatening to prevent the equally ill-advised Lake Powell pipeline -- to bring Colorado River water to arid southwestern Utah -- if Utah doesn't surrender. Why settle for one disaster when you can create two?

4. The Utah team claims the agreement "prohibits groundwater mining." Snake Valley ranchers, expert geologists, and former Southern Nevada Water Authority hydrologists and biologists know there is no excess renewable water in Utah's West Desert. This is the very definition of groundwater mining.

5. The agreement's "environmental safeguards" are anything but. For an area the size of Vermont, the underground aquifers to be tapped are the lifeline for plants such as the greasewood, which keeps the West Desert from being another Sahara Desert. Air-quality monitoring will reveal nothing until the greasewoods are dead. Routine dust storms in Owens Valley, Australia, Uzbekistan and the Middle East are evidence that in a desert new vegetation cannot be counted on to fill the void.

6. Both urban and rural Utah economies are threatened. Ask any urban Utahn whether air pollution already impairs our quality of life. Quality of life issues become economic issues, depressing real estate values, hurting existing businesses and suppressing new ones. Rural agriculture, tourism, hunting and fishing businesses will depreciate and possibly be destroyed.

7. Dust storms threaten life itself. The particles inhaled cause the same kind of disease as those from tailpipes, smokestacks and cigarettes. Within minutes, blood pressure rises, arteries become inflamed and clot formation begins, followed by increased numbers of heart attacks, strokes and deep-vein thrombosis. Even short-lived dust storms can have lasting impact. Community death rates increase during short-term elevations in particle pollution and stay elevated for up to 30 days after the air has cleared. That this dust is also contaminated with mercury, radioactivity, fungi, and asbestos-like minerals only adds to this risk.

8. Utah's negotiating team misrepresented Utah's legal options. Our deputy attorney general stated publicly that if Utah brought a dispute to the Supreme Court we would have to prove current damages, not potential future damages. Not true, according to at least two U.S. Supreme Court cases and our legal counsel. Enough science already exists, and more is being done, that would solidify Utah's case. The best chance to prevent this disaster is to stop it before it starts.

9. The only winners in any agreement are a handful of real estate speculators in Nevada and southern Utah. Everyone else loses. Utah gets no money for the water surrendered. When Snake Valley runs dry, even Nevada homeowners will be at risk as SNWA searches for more rural communities to exploit.

10. Utahns must stop this. Call and write the governor to tell Harry Reid and SNWA that Utah intends to win the war against these water terrorists.

Ruppert Steele is chairman, Confederated Tribes of the Goshute Indian Reservation; Brian Moench is president, Utah Physician s for a Healthy Environment; Terry Marasco is a Snake Valley business owner.