On Thursday, a coalition of elected officials, businesses, ag interests, and conservationists from across the Colorado River Basin will gather at Hoover Dam to demand that lawmakers and federal water managers impose a moratorium on wasteful, water-depleting dam and diversion projects along the shrinking waterway and its tributaries.
The call for change comes as states begin to receive federal dollars from the American Recovery Plan Act of 2021 and debate a federal infrastructure package with a myriad of water provisions. Officials across the west are considering allocating funds to projects like the Lake Powell Pipeline, dams and other diversions of water along the Colorado River and its tributaries even as there is less water in an already over-allocated river system.
The coalition members will outline a list of demands and announce other major requests that will protect the river, the people who depend on it, and the future of the American Southwest.
WHO:
Howard Dennis, flute chief of Mishognonvi Village of the Hopi Tribe
Tick Segerblom, Clark County Commissioner
JB Hamby, Director, Imperial Irrigation District
Kiernan McManus, Mayor, Boulder City
Jackie Wallin, Laughlin Chamber of Commerce
Brea Chiodini, Sharon Sauer, Laughlin River Tours & Laughlin-Bullhead City River Flow Committee
Zach Frankel, Utah Rivers Council
John Weisheit, Living Rivers and Colorado River Waterkeeper
Kyle Roerink, Great Basin Water Network
Jose Silva and Laura Martin, Progressive Leadership Alliance of Nevada
Patrick Donnelly, Center for Biological Diversity
Lisa Ortega, Sierra Club Southern Nevada Group
AND MORE….
WHERE:
Hoover Dam: Cross the dam to the Arizona side via the Kingman Wash Access Road (Not over the Mike O’Callaghan-Pat Tillman Memorial Bridge). We will be at Parking Lot 13. Shade structures and water will be provided.
WHEN:
Event begins at 9:30 AM PT on Thursday, July 15.
CAN’T MAKE IT? STREAM THE EVENT HERE: