Water district outlines $19M project, new 4 million‑gallon tank and drought concerns

Paul Monroe, general manager of the Central Iron County Water Conservancy District, updated the commission on a multi‑year water project that district staff say will strengthen reliability in Cedar Valley and support municipal interconnections.

Monroe said the district secured roughly $19,000,000 in financing in 2020 via a USDA Rural Development loan with approximately $4 million in grant funding; part of the loan carries a fixed interest near 1.75% under earlier market conditions. Work in 2024 included two loop lines (4000 North and 6000 North) and this week the district began constructing a 24‑inch transmission line to a planned 4,000,000‑gallon tank sited in the Iron Springs area. Monroe said the new tank will be the largest in Cedar Valley and is located at an elevation enabling the district to relieve pressure on Cedar City wells and to supply a broad portion of the valley floor. The district purchased a 20‑acre site at the Wye to provide an interconnect between a city 20‑inch transmission line and the district 24‑inch main; Monroe said the interconnect and a booster station at the Y will be cheaper to maintain than adding additional bowls (pump stages) to individual wells.

Monroe described parallel work on new groundwater supplies. The project will drill wells in Basin 71 (Esplanade/Escalante basin) to move some water by pipeline toward Innovatec/BCI facilities and to reduce reliance on Cedar Valley Basin 73 rights when possible. He noted that transfers between basins require acceptance of a depletion haircut (roughly 40% depletion historically retained in the aquifer). Monroe said Cedar City has purchased a block of Basin‑71 water rights and that interconnections will help diversify supplies to Cedar City and Enoch.

On recharge and drought, Monroe said the county is in an unusually dry year: mountain storage is well below normal and district estimates placed snowpack at roughly 23% of normal on his last check. “We have never had this little water on the mountain before,” he said. District staff and other presenters at the meeting urged residents and planners to expect recharge shortfalls this year and emphasized the importance of engineered recharge projects and coordinated basin management. Dan Jessen of local recharge proponents described an upcoming open house for a Perrowin Creek diversion‑to‑pipeline recharge project and said a coordinated funding mix (county, city, reservoir companies, pumpers and state grants) is being assembled.

Why it matters: the water district’s capital work aims to reduce high‑pressure pumping on older wells, add storage at a lower elevation, provide municipal interconnects and develop additional well capacity. Commissioners were told the district deliberately used cash reserves in 2024 to pause debt service and benefit from interest earned while deploying capital in phases; staff acknowledged a negative cash‑flow result on the construction account but defended the financing choice as cost‑effective under current rates.

Ending: district leaders asked the commission to continue support for regional recharge projects and noted that multiple legal and groundwater‑management proceedings are unresolved, including pending litigation tied to basin groundwater management plans; they urged attention to long‑term infrastructure coordination.