Water managers report progress on long-term plan; council members press for clearer public communication

Prescott City staff told the Council Subcommittee on Water Issues on June 2 that the multi-consultant long-term water management plan is advancing and that the project will be delivered in phases, with phase one focused on local supply and demand analysis and groundwater modeling.

Lesley Graaser, the city's water resource project manager, said the work brings together three consultants: Dishlip Consulting for supply-demand projections, Corollo Engineering for infrastructure and storm-water work, and Matrix New World for groundwater modeling. She said the city has submitted progress reports to the Bureau of Reclamation and has been reimbursed for an initial $40,000 grant, but that the study's scope has grown and staff has added consultants and technical memos to produce a more comprehensive plan.

"We started with a very small project awarded the grant ... we've been working since 2024," Graaser said, describing the technical memos that will underpin 10-, 25- and 50-year projections. She told the committee that two technical memos ' supply-demand and demand-management/conservation ' must be completed so the infrastructure and groundwater modeling teams can run scenarios.

Committee members pressed staff for clearer timelines and budget details. Several members asked for a written update and an itemized accounting of what is funded in the current and next fiscal-year budgets; staff agreed to provide the requested figures in writing. Council members also asked that the city step up public-facing communications about the study's scope and timing to prevent outside groups from speaking as if they represent the city's findings.

Graaser and water resources manager Brian Reese emphasized that phase one will focus on the Prescott active management area and the city's local aquifer (the Little Chino area), not on a broad importation study such as Big Chino in phase one. They said phase two would more directly examine large supply alternatives ' including advanced water purification or interbasin transfers ' after phase-one outputs identify what the city actually needs.

Council members raised questions about modeling assumptions and peer review. A committee member noted the importance of producing a groundwater-flow model with layered hydrogeologic information and specific-yield data so the results can be peer reviewed once they are public.

Staff said outreach materials (four-page information sheets and other plain-language summaries) are being prepared for public distribution and that technical memos will be shared with a review group as they near final draft. Revised schedules discussed in the meeting still target delivery of phase-one materials later in 2026, contingent on completing the supply-demand and conservation memos first.

What happens next: staff will provide the committee with a written budget breakdown and a short timeline update ahead of next week's meetings; staff also agreed to coordinate more frequent public communications as the project moves from phase one to community-facing discussions in phase two.