WILLCOX, Ariz. (KGUN) — "It's hurting economic development," said Willcox City Manager, Caleb Blaschke. "It's hurting our ability to grow.”
Blaschke and Willcox residents are concerned about the amount of water being used and pumped from the Willcox Playa Basin. Roughly 5,000 people rely on the City of Willcox for water.
"In the Willcox basin, you can pump as much water as you want, and there's no protections for residents. There's no protections for the city,” Blaschke.
He says there are over 1,600 water connections to the city waterlines, which includes businesses and residences.
“I think that's a big issue right now, is the water is not being recharged as quickly as the water is being taken out of the aquifer,” he said.
The city has three wells they use, two of which had to have serious fixes to them in May and August. Blaschke says they had to dig the wells deeper so the pipe could reach the groundwater.
“(In August) we saw our water decline very rapidly," he said. "We expected it to decline. We knew it was going to decline, it had been declining over the last several years.”
The city used grants and state funding to pay for the repairs. Blaschke says they recently received $2 million for well repairs and to dig a new well at the site of an old well.
He says the city uses at most 500,000 gallons of water a day, while large farms in the area can use more than 1 million gallons a day.
“It doesn’t matter what a homeowner does, it doesn't matter what a small farmer does. It matters what the pivots do, and what those large (agriculture) users do,” Blaschke said.
He says 300 new wells have been dug in and around the city in the past year. Blaschke and other city officials believe guidelines from the state government can save Willcox’s water.
“These regulations and rules are going to help the city of Willcox grow," he said. "They're going to help us to have jobs for our kids and our grandchildren so that we can sustain ourselves as a community.
"“This is critical. This is an emergency. Us as leaders, as elected representatives, need to make time and address the water problems, not only in the Willcox basin, but in other basins across Arizona.”
The Arizona Department of Water Resources is hosting an in-person and online meeting to inform local residents about the water issues happening and to hear local concerns. The meeting is Thursday night, at the Willcox Community Center, 312 W. Stewart St., from 6 - 8 p.m.
More information about the upcoming meeting here.
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Alexis Ramanjulu is a reporter in Cochise County for KGUN 9. She began her journalism career reporting for the Herald/Review in Sierra Vista, which she also calls home. Share your story ideas with Alexis by emailing alexis.ramanjulu@kgun9.com or by connecting on Facebook.
