Water talk

An addendum of notes and links, along with my talk in its entirety from the 25th annual Southwestern Water Conservation District Water Seminar.

By Daniel Berger
assistant editor
Headwaters News

Durango, Colo., April 6, 2007

Here is my talk as a PDF.

A couple of recent Western Perspective columns regarding water issues on Headwaters News:

Watering the West: A new report helps fill in the missing link between land-use and water planning. By Sarah B. Van de Wetering. March 15, 2007. Includes a follow-up on water conservation in San Antonio by Char Miller.

A Watershed Approach: There's a new homegrown democratic process at work in Montana and the West. By Karen Filipovich. Jan. 4, 2007

Taking the plunge: Colorado water basins explored research, data tools for regional water decisions. By Bridget Julian. November 4, 2006.

In my talk, I referred to a new report called "Bridging the Governance Gap: Strategies to Integrate Water and Land Use Planning" which Van de Wetering wrote, and which she wrote about in "Watering the West." Here's that report (PDF)

From the United States Geological Survey, a publication entitled "Ground Water and Surface Water A Single Resource." It's very helpful.

And the Montana Department of Natural Resources prepared this document on water rights in Montana (PDF). I'm sure other states have similar resources.

NewWest.net's Montana legislative reporter Dan Testa has done as good a job as I've seen covering water issues in the Montana Legislature. Click here and here and here for examples of the kinds of stories I'd like to see from other state legislative reporters. And click here for another article (different writer, same publication) on last year's Smith River decision regarding groundwater.

The Colorado College releases a Report Card on the Rockies each year. This year's report includes a chapter titled "Water Sustainability in the Rockies" that looks at water transfers. It's full of interesting data and case studies.

The Salt Lake Tribune and the Las Vegas Review-Journal have also both done a good job of covering water and development, though coverage isn't regular.

And the New York Times recently published an article entitled "An Arid West no Longer Waits for Rain," which does a nice job of presenting the issue in a regional context, and offering some of the proposed fixes.

In 2000, the Forest Service produced an excellent report entitled "Water and the Forest Service," available here. (PDF) It's worth reading and keeping.

And the two book to which I refereed at the end of my talk are "Cadillac Desert" by Marc Reisner and "Water Follies" by Robert Glennon. I'm sure there are others out there as well.

If you have any other links you'd like to post, or ideas to share, please let me know, and I'll update this page.