Take a minute to remember back to the summer of 2020. It’s a summer many will remember for a long time, in the height of the COVID pandemic. And for those living in the Southwest, it was also a summer of extreme heat, drought, and wildfires.
In fact, 2020 was the hottest and driest period on record in the Tucson area. And while we all experienced that time, what did we do in response? After no specific drought declaration or response by the City of Tucson, Pima County, or water utilities, we at WMG started to wonder why…
Why was there no drought response? And what should our drought response be?
It turns out that the City of Tucson’s drought response is based entirely on water levels in Lake Mead, where Colorado River water is stored and pumped hundreds of miles to be our primary municipal water supply. Pima County has a drought plan based on Lake Mead levels and some local conditions, however, no drought response actions have been implemented.
In 2020, we got a scant 4.2 inches of rain, compared to our average of 12 inches. On top of that it was hotter than ever, so our desert plants, urban forests, river ecosystems, and wildlife were suffering, even more than we were.
As WMG is building a hydro-local movement, we are asking:
How do we have local water resilience—enough water for people, plants, animals, and our river ecosystems—even in times of drought?
And, what policies do we need in place to live hydro-local?
Finally, what can WMG do as an educational organization communicating with the public on watershed health?
Since that very dry year, WMG co-founders, Catlow and Lisa Shipek, have been diving deep into drought planning, learning more about the city and county’s policies and actions, and bringing drought dialogues to the Santa Cruz Watershed Collaborative (SCWC).
SCWC was founded in 2017 and is a growing collaboration with over 40 government, nonprofit, tribal, and university partners all working towards a vision of people working together to ensure a healthy urban watershed with flowing rivers and streams. WMG helped co-found this organization and serves on the leadership team.
After several years of strategizing, pitching ideas, and writing grants, WMG secured two grants to lead a comprehensive drought planning initiative, working with the Santa Cruz Watershed Collaborative including the City of Tucson and Pima County. The goal? To develop watershed-wide coordination of drought planning and drought response, ensuring local water reliability and local watershed health, which includes healthy aquifers and rivers.
So what is drought? And how do we measure it? Drought happens when there is below average rainfall and snowpack or dropping levels of aquifers, river flows, or reservoirs. But there are so many other factors that impact water availability, including many human factors around our water policies, land management practices, and economics.
Last fall, Catlow and Lisa started working closely with a new Drought Advisory Team including Tucson Water, Pima County Regional Flood Control, Pima Association of Governments, and the University of Arizona.
The advisory team started by creating a new working definition of drought: Drought is an episodic deficit in water availability for the human and/or natural communities of the lower Santa Cruz Watershed caused by less precipitation, reduced streamflow, or decline in shallow groundwater levels. Drought may be localized by sub-watershed, sub-aquifer, or extend across the watershed.
Now we are working on defining clear drought triggers based on local watershed conditions — not just water levels in Lake Mead. For example, below average rainfall in the Tucson area will trigger a change in drought status. Dropping groundwater levels in sensitive riparian areas, like Sabino and Tanque Verde Creek, could trigger a change in drought status as well.
The Local Drought Plan will also include communication tools, suggested management actions and messaging, and policy recommendations for partners and water utilities to utilize. WMG, alongside other SCWC partners, will start to communicate more regularly about drought, sharing coordinated messaging that will help create a collective response.
This work feels particularly timely as we experience another extreme drought period. August 2024 - March 2025 is the driest six months on record in the Tucson area. We are seeing the direct impacts of that extreme drought as many of our creeks are dry and many water harvesting tanks are now empty, waiting for more rain.
Now is a time for us all to respond, not only with water conservation efforts, but with stewardship actions to care for our stressed plants, animals, and ecosystems. We are eager to develop the tools and coordinated response to tackle the climate challenges of the day, and we’re deeply grateful to the Santa Cruz Watershed Collaborative partners for working towards a more resilient water future together.
Existing Drought Plans
City of Tucson – Tucson Water
Drought trigger: Lake Mead levels
Drought response:
- Tier 1 declared in 2022
- Tier 2 declared in 2023 & 2024
- Tucson Water Conservation Program staff implement actions such as encouraging water audits to high water use customers
Pima County
Drought triggers: Lake Mead and some local conditions
Drought response: None to date