Anti-diversion bill heads to House Written by Geoffrey Plant on February 24, 2021
With the majority Democratic members of two key state legislative committees recommending in hearings over consecutive Saturdays that a House bill to sideline the Gila River diversion group “do pass,” the future of the New Mexico Entity of the Central Arizona Project has never looked so imperiled.
As the bill, titled “Water Trust Board Projects and N.M. Unit Fund,” heads to the House floor for a vote as soon as this week, N.M. CAP Entity Executive Director Anthony Gutierrez made an appearance at a work session for Grant County commissioners on Tuesday morning. Like all of the presenters at the work session, Gutierrez made his presentation by video. He began his talk with a disclaimer that everything he was about to say might soon be rendered moot by the passage of House Bill 200.
February 12, 2021
Gila diversion group asserts primacy as legislation threatens Written by Geoffrey Plant on February 12, 2021
With a proposal in Santa Fe threatening its very existence, the New Mexico Entity of the Central Arizona Project the group that was formed in 2015 to build the ultimately unsuccessful Gila diversion project is having to defend the role it could play when it comes to administering the more than $80 million in the N.M. Unit Fund.
The massive pot of money is destined to be spent, per the 2004 federal Arizona Water Settlements Act, either on a ※New Mexico Unit,” i.e., a surface water diversion, or on ※other water utilization alternatives to meet water supply demands in the Southwest Water Planning Region of New Mexico.”
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ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. The Albuquerque Bernalillo County Water Utility Authority will install 10,000 more of these automated water meters with $2 million from the New Mexico Water Trust Board. (Journal File)
The Albuquerque Bernalillo County Water Utility Authority has received $2 million from the New Mexico Water Trust Board to update water meters.
The agreement, finalized at Wednesday’s board meeting, includes an $800,000 loan and $1.2 million grant.
About 10,000 Advanced Metering Infrastructure water meters will be installed with the money.
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Automated meters provide real-time water use data for customers and the water authority, said Chief Financial Officer Stan Allred.
They save money by reducing the workload of employees checking traditional meters, and can provide more accurate water bill amounts.