{"id":2443053,"date":"2019-04-16T18:24:00","date_gmt":"2019-04-17T00:24:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.aspentimes.com\/news\/trump-signs-colorado-river-drought-proposal\/"},"modified":"2019-04-16T18:24:00","modified_gmt":"2019-04-17T00:24:00","slug":"trump-signs-colorado-river-drought-proposal","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/local-news\/trump-signs-colorado-river-drought-proposal\/","title":{"rendered":"Trump signs Colorado River drought proposal"},"content":{"rendered":"<figure class=\"wp-block-image\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"620\" height=\"414\" src=\"https:\/\/cdn.aspentimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2019\/04\/wireriver-atd-041719-1.jpg\" class=\"attachment-large size-large wp-post-image\" alt srcset=\"https:\/\/cdn.aspentimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2019\/04\/wireriver-atd-041719-1.jpg 620w, https:\/\/cdn.aspentimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2019\/04\/wireriver-atd-041719-1-300x200.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 620px) 100vw, 620px\"><\/figure>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">PHOENIX \u2014 President Donald Trump on Tuesday signed a plan to cut back on the use of water from the Colorado River, which serves 40 million people in the U.S. West.<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">The Colorado River drought contingency plan aims to keep two key reservoirs, Lakes Powell and Mead, from falling so low they cannot deliver water or produce hydropower. It was negotiated among the seven states that draw water from the river.<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">Mexico also agreed to store water in Lake Mead on the Arizona-Nevada border if the U.S. legislation was approved by April 22.<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">The legislation was supported by all 14 senators from the Colorado River Basin states, though Trump announced his action in a tweet that singled out Arizona Republican Sen. Martha McSally, who is in a tough fight for re-election next year.<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">\u201cThanks to @SenMcSallyAZ for getting it done,\u201d Trump wrote. \u201cBig deal for Arizona!\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">Arizona has the lowest-priority access to Colorado River water and will be hit hardest. The state negotiated a separate agreement to provide other water sources and new groundwater infrastructure for farmers in Pinal County between Phoenix and Tucson.<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">Arizona and Nevada agreed to keep water in Lake Mead when it falls to certain levels. The cuts eventually would loop in California if the reservoir drops far enough.<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">The Metropolitan Water District, which supplies drinking water to millions in Southern California, agreed to shoulder California\u2019s share of cutbacks if they\u2019re needed. That pledge cut out the Imperial Irrigation District, which has the largest entitlement to Colorado River water and had said it would only participate in the arrangement if it secured money to resolve environmental problems at the shrinking Salton Sea.<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey, a Republican, celebrated the approval as \u201ca monumental, bipartisan achievement.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">State water managers and federal officials have cited a prolonged drought, climate change and increasing demand for the river\u2019s flows as reasons to cut back on water usage.<\/p>\n<p class=\"STND-STND BodyText\">The drought plan calls for cutbacks through 2026. The states are scheduled to begin negotiations soon over even more severe cuts to deal with a long-term shortage in water on the Colorado River.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.aspentimes.com\/news\/trump-signs-colorado-river-drought-proposal\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">via:: The Aspen Times<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>PHOENIX \u2014 President Donald Trump on Tuesday signed a plan to cut back on the use of water from the Colorado River, which serves 40 million people in the U.S. West. The Colorado River drought contingency plan aims to keep two key reservoirs, Lakes Powell and Mead, from falling so low they cannot deliver water [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[49],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-2443053","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-local-news"},"acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-06-16 18:27:30","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"distributor_meta":false,"distributor_terms":false,"distributor_media":false,"distributor_original_site_name":"KSPN The Valley&#039;s Quality Rock","distributor_original_site_url":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn","push-errors":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2443053","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2443053"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2443053\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2443053"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2443053"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2443053"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}