Delph Carpenter News Today : Breaking News, Live Updates & Top Stories | Vimarsana

Delph Carpenter was an attorney from Colorado who by 1922 had developed extensive expertise in water law guiding the Colorado River Commission.

The Colorado River’s current crisis traces its roots back to 1922. That’s when leaders from the rapidly-growing southwestern states that rely on the river traveled to a swanky Santa Fe mountain retreat to divvy up the river’s water. Growing populations in some of the West’s burgeoning cities and sprawling farmlands, and the anxieties tied to that growth, pushed leaders to the negotiating table. The Colorado River Compact was the result of those talks. This attempt to manage the dynamic river system was fraught from the very beginning. To get a deal passed the men overestimated the rive...

A hundred years ago this month, a handful of men tasked with divvying up the Colorado River gravely misjudged its character. Is it too late to fix their mistakes?

By ERIK KUHN and JENNIFER GIMBEL

Western river compacts were innovative in the 1920s but couldn’t foresee today’s water challenges.