Water authority correct to move forward

More than 140 people turned out Monday for a Henderson public hearing on the Southern Nevada Water Authority’s plan to pipe 220,000 acre-feet of groundwater per year from the Cave Valley, Dry Lake and Delamar valleys in east central Nevada, between Alamo and Ely.

Comments ran 4-to-1 against — no great surprise.

Northern Nevada residents, including ranchers and fishermen who fear a change to their landscape and way of life, have every right to worry about a water grab like the one that piped the water of California’s Owens Valley to thirsty Los Angeles. The water authority insists safeguards are in place to monitor groundwater levels if the pumping ever begins. But some skepticism is understandable. These rural Nevadans’ concerns should be fully aired and measured against real-world results if the time ever comes.

As for the usual gang of foot-draggers from the environmental lobby, their credibility might be enhanced if they could list any examples of pro-human development and progress they’ve actually supported in recent decades.

In the end, water is a state resource, and — aside from mining, which has also been known to use some water — Las Vegas is the economic engine that drives Nevada. Developing alternative sources for this arid state’s most populous county is just common sense.

The water authority says it has no plans to build the pipeline immediately — thanks to the current economic slowdown — but it wants to complete the lengthy and cumbersome approval process so the project is ready to go if needed.

As it well could be.

Yes, re-crafting the 80-year-old, multistate agreement that limits Nevada’s share of Colorado River water could be a better solution — as could a multistate project to provide water from the often-flooded Mississippi River system to cities on the Colorado’s east slope, convincing them in return to stop piping water across the Great Divide.

Anyone who knows how to make those things happen quickly, in the current political world, should please not be shy about stepping forward.

For now, Las Vegas is 90 percent dependent on Colorado River water, and the coincidence of an economic downturn and recent rising water levels at Lake Mead should not lull anyone into a false sense of security. Should drought and boom times return together, it would be awfully late to start the decades-long approval process for this pipeline, again.

Las Vegans may someday look back and thank their lucky stars that someone insisted on planning this far ahead and keeping their shoulder to the wheel.