Some Arizona farmers will have to deal with changes this year due to actions that the state has not previously taken for 45 years. The Arizona Department of Water Resources (ADWR) declared an Active Management Area for a 1,911 square mile region in the southeastern part of the state.
The area affected by the state’s designation is the Willcox Groundwater Basin in Cochise County. The Department of Water Resources reported that the area has had a severe water imbalance.
Residents voted against the designation in 2022. But ADWR used its authority – which it had not used since 1980 – to declare the Willcox Groundwater Basin an Active Management Area. That effectively blocks agricultural expansion since it does not permit any new lands to be farmed.
“Excessive groundwater mining and declining water levels have caused multiple wells in the Willcox basin to go dry,” stated Chief Hydrologist Ryan Mitchell in a memo to ADWR Director Tom Buschatzke on October 21st, 2024.
“Since the department's establishment, ADWR hydrologists have attempted to measure water levels in 71 wells that previously had water but have subsequently gone dry, with 29 of those wells going dry in the last 10 years,” Mitchell wrote.
RELATED: Read the memorandum here from Chief Hydrologist Ryan Mitchell to ADWR Director Tom Buschatzke explaining where wells have gone dry in recent years because of insufficient water supply. The memo also includes pictures of site surveys that illustrated the dry wells.
While the aquifer’s stability has deteriorated recently, it has been a worsening woe for decades
Mitchell’s report detailed, “The Willcox basin has been experiencing significant groundwater level declines since the 1950s. The rate of decline has increased over time. As the widespread decline in water levels indicates, the aquifer system's outflows far exceed its inflows.”
Mitchell warned that the situation merited action. “If current rates of groundwater withdrawal continue or increase, and recharge rates do not change, groundwater level declines will continue to worsen.”
The required action, according to ADWR’s investigation, would be the declaration of an Active Management Area for the Willcox Groundwater Basin.
The report cited the agency’s authority in the statutes:
“ARS § 45-412 authorizes the Director of ADWR to designate a groundwater basin as a subsequent AMA if any of the following exist:
1. Active management practices are necessary to preserve the existing supply of groundwater for future needs.
2. Land subsidence or fissuring is endangering property or potential groundwater storage capacity.
3. Use of groundwater is resulting in actual or threatened water quality degradation.”
Opponents see the state’s action as an overreach. While some acknowledge the aquifer depletion that has been occurring over the years, they don’t want to see a state agency issue restrictions that voters previously opposed.
Politicians, farmers, business owners, and environmentalists are now all trying to figure out what the impact of the designation will have on the region for the coming years.
RELATED: The Arizona Republican put together a story on why some farmland owners oppose the Active Management Area designation for the Willcox Groundwater Basin, why a former state leader believes that the action should have happened much sooner, and why Arizona’s governor thinks the action will protect the 8,100 people in the area.
