City to OK water theft by developer : AZ IMC

This Tuesday at 3pm will be your last chance to join other concerned citizens in influencing a very important city council decision. The Prescott City Council is voting on whether or not to purchase the JWK Ranch for its 8,700 acre-ft of water rights to the Big Chino aquifer. The city claims this new water is NEEDED for projected growth in Prescott, but 7000 acre-ft of the water already has a planned destination... A very wealthy developing corporation (with ties to the giant Del Webb corporation) has already made initial agreements with Prescott and Prescott Valley City Councils to build a super-development next to Granite Dells and Watson Lake. It will have up to 20,000 new homes -- a “city” two times larger than Anthem! This development is not “NEEDED”, the city council is CHOOSING to allow a new city to be built outside of both PV and Prescott’s current city limits, and then annexing it into the cities!

Besides the huge environmental impact on the Upper Verde watershed and the assured result of traffic congestion and strip-malling of Hwy 89, this water give-a-way will cost taxpayers 40-50 million dollars. These developers are legally able -- and certainly financially capable -- of buying the water rights themselves from the JWK Ranch, but why would they if the developers could trick taxpayers into buying it for them? Our local government is clearly acting as this developer’s “agents” for water rights.

There are plenty of reasons why buying the JWK Ranch will be an environmental disaster even if the water is not given to this development. However, this city council will only respond to money issues. When communicating our message at this meeting on Tuesday, it is essential to drill in the financial aspect of this travesty: that we don’t want to buy a super-development.

The potential decisions the city council will make in the next 2 weeks will have severe impacts on wildlife, the shape and quality of our community and the public’s control over our water. Once the water is allocated to the landowner, and the houses are built, it is not coming back. These decisions are enormous and will be affecting Prescott and the surrounding natural areas permanently.

The city council meeting to discuss the JWK Ranch purchase and the Intergovernmental Agreement with Prescott Valley concerning that purchase will be held at 3pm Tues. Dec. 7th at the old Armory on Gurley St. (next to Ken Lindley field and the Smoki Museum).

There will be a meeting at the MAD Linguist (111 N McCormick St) on Sunday morning at 10 a.m. to discuss plans for how to make the best impact on the upcoming meetings. It will be really helpful if you can attend on Sunday, and if not please plan on being at the city council meeting on Tuesday.

Katie Nelson
The Catalyst Infoshop
Catalyst-infoshop@lycos.com
928-443-8525

*If the city buys the JWK Ranch we’re going to be in for a long hard battle. For the time being The Catalyst will be a convergence space and information center on these water issues. Please email or call with your ideas for action, questions, and feedback.