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Board approves county application to WIFA as applicant for water-well project with Yuma County Water Users
Summary
The Yuma County Board of Supervisors approved a motion to submit a Water Infrastructure Financing Authority (WIFA) grant application, with Yuma County as applicant and Yuma County Water Users Association as subrecipient, to fund drilling three groundwater wells that would produce return-flow credits under the 1944 U.S.–Mexico treaty.
The Yuma County Board of Supervisors voted on Feb. 3 to approve a county application to the Arizona Water Infrastructure Financing Authority (WIFA) for a Water Supply Development Building Fund grant to support a project led by the Yuma County Water Users Association to drill three groundwater wells.
Veronica Garcia, Yuma County grants administrator, told the board the county would apply for grant funding that — if awarded — would flow to Yuma County and be implemented by the Yuma County Water Users Association under a subrecipient agreement.
Charles Cowan, representing the Yuma County Water Users Association, described the project as drilling three wells to extract problematic groundwater, discharging it into the county drainage system and conveying it to the San Luis area where, at the association’s expense, it would be released into the San Luis Canal. Cowan said water conveyed across the southerly international boundary generates return-flow credits under the 1944 U.S.–Mexico treaty; each acre-foot pushed across that boundary, he said, helps conserve water upstream in Lake Mead and can benefit junior entitlement holders in Arizona.
Cowan said the project will require power lines, discharge pipelines and SCADA telemetry; he noted the association can access low-cost federal hydropower through the Parker–Davis system and that the proposed funding source is a grant (not a loan) administered by the state.
Board members asked how many local water districts exist; Cowan listed several including North Gila, Yuma Irrigation District, Yuma Mesa, Yuma County Water Users, Long Island Mohawk and a Hard Water District across the river. A supervisor asked if the project would help the state’s obligations under the 1944 treaty; Cowan replied it would and said the association expects the wells to operate with an estimated 20-year useful life.
A motion and second were offered to accept the county application and the collaboration with Yuma County Water Users. The clerk recorded a voice vote; the board chair announced the motion carried.
There was no dollar amount specified in the meeting record for the requested WIFA grant, nor a schedule for award or implementation timelines beyond the project description. The board did not authorize contracting or expenditure authority at the meeting; the action approved submitting the application with Yuma County as the applicant and the Water Users association as subrecipient.
