In the latest installment of Arizona’s Groundwater Wars, the Attorney General’s Office reaches a settlement with the Minnesota “mega dairy” Riverview LLC, operating in the Kansas Settlement area of Cochise County.
But last week also saw a legal victory for challengers against the Department of Water Resources and their 2022 designation of the Hualapai Valley Basin as an Irrigation Non-expansion Area. So today’s edition is a double feature.
Like water, news about water is a resource worth preserving. You can do your part by upgrading to a paid subscription of the Water Agenda!
P.S. We’re still working out some bugs in how emails are formatted on our new distribution platform. If anything is hard to read, please bear with us until the next edition.
Last week, Attorney General Kris Mayes visited the Willcox Active Management Area to publicly announce her office’s settlement with Riverview, LLP. It was something of a sequel to Mayes’ packed townhall in the same community building, back in 2024, when citizens spent over two hours expressing the pains of dry wells, fears of dry futures, and much resentment toward Riverview, the greatest water user in the area. Mayes has repeatedly cited that town hall as the most impactful she’s ever hosted.
The settlement comes on the back of Mayes’ ongoing lawsuit against Saudi alfalfa growers Fondomonte in La Paz County, and her promise to pursue similar “public nuisance” charges against Riverview. The settlement was reached after more than a year of investigations and negotiations.
Mayes paints the investigation as having loomed large in her mind.
“There were moments when I would get a little impatient, because every minute that goes by is another minute where people are losing their water supply and possibly losing their homes. ... I would remind folks in my office that it had been a year and a half since that first town hall,” Mayes said in an interview with the Water Agenda.
Her office’s press release includes over a dozen positive comments from big names in state politics, water and local communities, including Sens. Ruben Gallego and Mark Kelly, water policy expert Kathy Ferris, former Willcox Mayor Mike Laws and farmer Ed Curry.
"I am amazed at this development! It is not something I ever thought would actually happen,” commented Lisa Glenn, a resident of Willcox for over 50 years.
Per the settlement, Riverview has agreed to put $5.5 million toward a third-party-administered charitable fund, and another $5.5 million to a Riverview-administered fund, both to help residents and schools repair or attain water access.
Riverview’s in-house fund will serve eligible applicants within a 1.6-mile radius of wells owned by the company. The third-party fund will serve applicants outside of those boundaries, with Riverview having “no approval, veto, or control” over that fund.
The company has also agreed to fallow 2,000 acres of its farmland over twelve years, with the option to put the land toward other uses including “grazing, habitat, or other non-row-crop agricultural uses.” A yet-unresolved question is whether those alternative land uses might have their own water demands, such as irrigated cow pasture which can use as much or more water than row crops. In any case, the schedule for fallowing the land will iterate over 12 years.
Mayes told us that the negotiations ended in a “good place” but that she wanted more out of the deal, often characterizing it as a “first step” which she hopes will serve as a model for future water conservation agreements in rural Arizona’s agricultural communities.
“I had to make a call between suing this company, which could have been protracted and gone on for years or years, or getting something good and immediate for the people of Sulphur Springs Valley. … There were a lot of folks [at the settlement announcement] who didn’t think it went far enough. And I’m with them on that,” the Attorney General said.
Mayes’ biggest critic was County Supervisor Frank Antenori, who distributed a polemic one-page “Official Statement” at the public announcement.
“Tony Saprano [sic] couldn’t have done it better and he’d be envious of what is literally a mafia class shakedown of a private, law-abiding company by a bully that abuses her office,” the commentary begins.
For its part, Riverview speaks positively of the settlement.
“Attorney General Mayes has helped highlight these challenges, and we appreciate her efforts in identifying these tangible steps to help Arizonans in need,” the statement says. “By working together with state and local leaders, we can strengthen local water access and build a more sustainable future.”
While the settlement brings Mayes’ investigation to closure, it also states that Mayes and Riverview maintain disagreement about whether Riverview’s actions and operations constitute a “public nuisance.”
THE INVESTORS STRIKE BACK
In other rural groundwater news last week, the Maricopa Superior Court ruled in favor of plaintiffs challenging the Arizona Department of Water Resources’ (ADWR) establishment of the Hualapai Valley Irrigation Non-expansion Area (INA) in Mohave County.
Note: Like Active Management Areas, INAs stop the development of new acres for agricultural irrigation. Unlike AMAs, INAs do not require water users to limit or reduce their water usage.
ADWR’s designation came after the Mohave Board of Supervisors’ 2022 request that the agency take “whatever actions available and necessary to designate the Hualapai Valley Groundwater Basin as a subsequent INA.”
A 2021 report from the U.S. Geological Survey puts the valley’s annual water inputs at 10,700 acrefeet and outputs at 41,000 acrefeet, meaning their “water budget” is being overdrafted at a four-to-one rate. In 2011, domestic and municipal water use accounted for 90 percent of the valley’s total water demands, which were well within their budget. Industrial agriculture began in the area in 2014, and now comprises 74% of total water demands — an additional 26,000 acrefeet annually — which creates a significant overdraft and groundwater declines.
In 2023, the INA designation was challenged by Opal Investments and Steff Investments, agricultural land owners in the valley which appear to be Utah-based and Nevada-based companies respectively.
One argument from the plaintiffs claimed that ADWR did not present sufficient evidence for the designation of the INA. Another argument was that the designation constituted “rulemaking” by the agency, which would be governed by the Arizona Administrative Procedure Act (APA) and requires approval by the Governor’s Regulatory Review Counsel or the Arizona Attorney General — procedures which the agency hasn’t undertaken in establishing subsequent INAs and AMAs.
The court ruled on the second argument, agreeing with plaintiffs that ADWR’s designation constitutes “rulemaking,” and it vacated the agency’s order. The other arguments in the case were declared “moot or unpersuasive,” but the ruling implied that the court may have ruled in favor of the out-of-state companies on those arguments as well.
“Mohave County is confident that the state will not back down and will seek an immediate stay, pursue an appeal, and ultimately prevail,” Mohave County Supervisors Chairman Travis Lingenfelter told us.
A spokesperson for the Governor’s Office confirmed that ADWR will fight the ruling and is “likely to seek a stay to keep the INA in place while the appeal is pending, so that Mohave County’s groundwater will be protected during these proceedings.”
What happens if an appeal fails?
Future INA and AMA designations may be rejected by the Regulatory Review Counsel or Attorney General’s Office.
A failure would also open the door to legal challenges to the new AMA established last week in La Paz County’s water-short Ranegras Plain Basin.
If you thought we did a pretty good job with the Water Agenda last year, you can show us your appreciation by pitching in for another year of reporting on the most important water issues in the state.
EXTRA CREDIT
We all have our morning rituals, the familiar patterns that give us a little boost as we face the mystery of a new, unfolding day. For some, that ritual includes enjoying a morning coffee in the company of AI-generated trad-girlfriends on Twitter.
@kathae909 is a “digital artist and storyteller creating cinematic AI art centered around coffee, connection, humor, and adventure” and “Just a girl who loves MAGA.” The account makes hourly posts of AI-generated videos of “herself” in scenic environments, like this one posted last week.
The post received 97 likes, 34 reposts, and 73 comments — and four bookmarks, perhaps by people who already know they’ll become nostalgic for that amazing morning they spent with Kathleen D at Havasu falls.
Most of the comments come from MAGA randos, but an incredible number of the replies come from other AI accounts which implant their own AI characters into the same scene with Kathleen D.
Not only is this a bizarre Twitter trend on its own, but also makes one reflect on the fact that AI and data centers are using real Arizona water to generate videos of fake Arizona water.