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County reviews preliminary application from Canada de Los Alamos to become wholesale water customer; staff flags cost and water-rights issues
Summary
Commissioners received WPAC and staff reports on Canada de Los Alamos—9 request to become a wholesale water customer; WPAC favored approval but staff highlighted $11M+ capital costs and water-right transfer uncertainties.
Santa Fe County commissioners heard a staff briefing and Water Policy Advisory Committee (WPAC) recommendation on a preliminary application from the Canada de Los Alamos mutual domestic water association seeking to become a wholesale county water customer.
Travis Soderquist, deputy utility director, summarized findings in the WPAC and staff reports. Canada de Los Alamos currently serves about 24 connections from groundwater wells that the group says have become unusable due to declining production or contamination. WPAC recommended approval of the preliminary application and encouraged the county and association to develop a memorandum of understanding and proceed with engineering and grant-planning work.
County utility staff urged caution. A preliminary engineering estimate included in the applicant—9s planning documents put project cost in a range of $11 million to $12.2 million for the phase-1 infrastructure that would deliver county water to the association—9s storage tank; staff calculated that the cost translated to roughly $480,000 per existing connection for the first phase. Staff also noted a projected 12.9-day water travel time from county treatment to the storage tank, which raises distribution and regulatory concerns; and they warned that transferring local groundwater rights to the county may require hydrologic proof and might be reduced in volume by the Office of the State Engineer, exposing the county to additional cost or fee-in-lieu obligations.
Commissioners asked for more context and alternatives. Several suggested county staff explore lower-cost interim or alternative delivery options (for example, structured bulk water delivery or a county-run trucking program) and examine regional implications: other wells in the area, the number of at-risk domestic wells and the county—9s ongoing capital projects that could compete for funding (including wastewater plant expansion and other utilities investments). Staff said capital decisions should follow the county—9s normal budget process and that final approval of a preliminary application is premature without a budget decision to cover infrastructure costs.
Action requested and next steps: No final board action was requested at the meeting. Staff asked the board for direction about whether to treat the application as eligible to proceed to the final application stage under Resolution 2015-121, and to allow budgeting and further design work in the coming budget cycle if the board chooses to advance the request. WPAC recommended approval and staff recommended that the board not approve capital expenditures outside the normal budget process; the board did not make a final funding decision on Feb. 11.
Why this matters: A wholesale connection would shift large capital costs and long-term operational responsibility onto county utilities for infrastructure up to the mutual domestic—9s master meter. Staff said the project could strain the county—9s water-right portfolio and capital budget and will require detailed water-right and hydrologic analyses before the county takes on commitments.
