Water Needs

Branch Cox took the microphone and told the crowd that there were government subsidies for the farmers that would need it. Awkwardness pervaded the Fairview Elementary school gym, an awkwardness that was spawned out of principle and reality. You see this gym was full of farmers and shareholders of the Cottonwood-Gooseberry Irrigation Company. The majority of which were adamant republicans, conservative to the core of their beings. Taking handouts from the government was against what they preached, but the reality was that without the subsidies there was no living. They wouldn't make it this year. Not with the water being so low.

It had been a bad winter. Bad, not in the way most people refer to a bad winter: with snowstorms galore, and foot after foot of snow. This was a really bad winter, almost no snow, no rain, no water; and in Utah, for farmers that was bad. The farmers in the school gym would be lucky to get one full crop this summer when usually they could get 3 crops.

On my way into the gym, I had overheard a man say, "We'll live through it either way." And that was a general feeling: grin and bear it. But when the subsidies were mentioned, nobody wanted to openly admit it might be them that needed it. But the grass was going to die. Trees would suffer. The farms would go dry.

Someone asked, "Is Fairview the anomaly? Are we dryer than the rest of the valley?"

"Fairview is the anomaly," Lynn Anderson responded, the president of the small company. "But Fairview is the anomaly because we have water stored. Mt. Pleasant is already on extreme rationing."

Driving through Sanpete County it is hard to envision what is to come. To look around you would never know we are in short supply of water. Water is everywhere. For now, the fields are green, the creeks are running, sprinklers are spraying, and car washes are thrumming. The mountains have snow cresting their peaks and life springing forth on their slopes. Trees and bushes are blossoming all around. In these high-desert mountain-valleys spring doesn't arrive until May, but when it does it brings life to the hills and fields. And for a month everything will shine. But come June that green will change hues. Losing its vibrancy. Drying out until it is mostly brown. And this year will be worse than most.

The water game is one of preemptive thought. What we have now won't be around later. How can we save and plan so the water makes it through the summer and fall? Northern Utah was able to save water last year, so their dams and reservoirs are brimming. Good thing too. Their populations are expanding with unprecedented growth. Central Utah didn't. So this year, with so little precipitation, things are going to be tough. When things get tough, things get ugly.

People turning against one another, fighting over water in the West isn't new. For centuries cattlemen and sheepherders have fought over who gets the watering holes. I used to think it was the range, the feed, the ranchers were fighting over, but the truth is that cattle and sheep eat different things: cattle prefer grass, and sheep eat the other vegetation. Many people have even run sheep and cattle on the same ranges; it was the water and the resources attached to the water that was being fought over. Plants don’t grow without water. Even cactuses need water. In the western United States, water is rare. This is a desert climate. And the law of the West, the law governing water has been a first come first serve kind of law. Water rights are dictated by who has been around the longest, and if they can prove that they've used that water with a purpose. So for the ranchers, whoever could get to the water first was who got to use it.

All the way back in 1869 when John Wesley Powell first navigated the Green River and the Colorado River he declared that there wasn't going to be enough water for all the settlers. Later, in 1878, Powell published a report that described a plan for Western water use. A large part of this plan was to avoid overpopulating areas with little water reserves and to delegate the water by using a cooperative system like the Mormon pioneers used to settle Salt Lake City. But Powell was ignored. Today, because of massive urban growth, the Colorado River has so many demands and uses for it, that it never even reaches the Sea of Cortez: it's natural outlet.

Lake Mead is fed from the Colorado River and it is one of the biggest reservoirs in the country, directly feeding Southern California and Arizona. Providing water to more than 40 million Americans. But demands on the water and the lack of water returning to the system are leading to critical decisions and most likely severe restrictions. It isn't just California and Arizona that are dependent on the Colorado River. Utah, New Mexico, Colorado, Wyoming, and Nevada also depend on the water that feeds into the Colorado River. Water, a scarcity in the desert, is becoming harder and harder to find, even while demands for it continue to rise. There are at least two different major pipeline projects that are in different stages of proposal. These would take more water from the river.

Ironically, the Cottonwood-Gooseberry Irrigation Company is modeled in a way that Powell would approve of. It is a non-profit cooperative group of shareholders. The board of directors is selected from the shareholders. And in many ways, this allows for fewer conflicts but doesn't resolve all conflict. When water is scarce, and people depend on it for their livelihoods, tempers flare.

Matt and Jody Yelsma have lived in this area for quite some time. They have one son still at home. It is Matt that maintains, runs, and controls the water flow for the Cottonwood-Gooseberry Irrigation Company. It isn't necessarily his job to decide how much water is distributed, where it goes, when it goes, or when it gets shut off. That is the board of directors job. Matt and Jody have both had experiences where someone has stopped them to berate them for the lack of water at their house or their farm. Matt has had angry notes left on his windshield, and they have had threatening notes thrown on their lawn using bricks. And in most cases, the people threatening or berating, getting the angriest, are the people that don't take the time to become informed about the water situation.

Already Fairview City has said that culinary water can't be used for outside use. One of the city’s pumps needs repairing and that well will be out of commission for almost two months. But most of the city has no idea. They haven't been informed. So while one neighbor knows and follows the water regulations, another neighbor waters their grass full time. This leads to frustration and contention.

I am no better than most. I only recently found out about the water situation here in Fairview. I attended one meeting. And the question I keep coming back to is, as far as ethics go, and water use, what is my responsibility?

I live next door to my grandma. I told her about the water restrictions. I told her that culinary water isn't supposed to be used outside. She gets around this through funky rationalization: she "skips" a shower, and uses the water she "would've used anyway" to run a hose to one of her trees for thirty minutes. She fills up jugs of water in her sink saying, "I run the water until its cold because it's healthier for you. But while it runs I save the water rather than letting it go down the drain." She then uses those jugs to water her garden. And here is the kicker: my grandma can't do these things on her own. Her mobility impairs her, so she asks me to run the hose to the tree. She asks me to take the jugs to water the garden. I know better. I know what she is doing. But if I don't help her she'll still try to do it. If I don't help she could get hurt.

This isn't the first time she has implicated me in one of her crimes. She abducted the neighbor's cat, renamed it Boots and made it her own, then had me help her get it fixed by taking it to the vet. "She was half starved and surely would've died," my grandma likes to tell me. At the time Boots had 6 kittens and all of them looked a bit starved but they were also the Franklin's cats. So in my book that meant, leave them well enough alone. If they died they died.  But to my grandma that meant adopt Boots, and feed the kittens. 

In both cases, I rationalize that there isn't anything I could do differently. My grandma made up her mind, and if I didn't help her she would still find a way to do these things. But my conscience, particularly in regards to this area's water needs, has me wondering about ethics. If we'd all followed John Wesley Powell's advice, water wouldn't be as much of an issue. But we ignored him, we served ourselves first: we've overpopulated areas sparse with water, we've dictated water rights from a first come first serve basis, we've failed to communicate or even acknowledge the dire state of water reserves. Even when we know we put our other needs or desires first. Why does it matter if I use just a little extra water to keep my garden alive? Why does it matter that I use a little extra water to keep my yard pretty or my farm going? Why does it matter?