December 2011
Governing Like A River Basin
Greetings!
A lot of us have been thinking ahead to what will happen after the Bureau of Reclamation releases its final Colorado River Basin Study next year. The goals of the study are both laudable and ambitious: to analyze a full range of options and opportunities for bringing long-term water supply and demand into balance in a basin that faces a drier future due to climate change.
But assembling the broad-based political support it will take to get those options funded and implemented will be a challenging task. Many leaders have suggested that some process for engaging a diverse range of stakeholders from throughout the basin would be helpful in building that broad support.
With this month’s Confluence, we are releasing the new Carpe Diem West policy brief, Governing Like a River Basin: Options for Expanded Stakeholder Engagement in the Colorado River Basin. This brief analyzes examples of stakeholder processes in four large U.S. river basins facing long-term management challenges, and discusses what these approaches might look like on the Colorado.
We also get perspectives on stakeholder engagement from two of the most experienced and respected voices in the Colorado River water community: Bob Johnson and Bill Rinne.
Regards,
Kimery
 |
Kimery Wiltshire |
|
An Interview with Bob Johnson
Q: You’ve talked about the importance of ensuring that people with an interest in Colorado River management are heard. What benefits flow from that? BJ: The biggest benefit is that it gives an opportunity to get a good understanding of everyone’s concerns, and to consider their views in decision making. It can also help avoid conflict down the road, and that is good for everybody.
|
An Interview with Bill Rinne
Q: What do you see as the potential advantages and disadvantages of creating more stakeholder collaboration in Colorado Basin water management? BR: I am a great believer in collaboration, for a couple of reasons. First, it can be very helpful in identifying the real issues. Sometimes, it might look on the surface like people are completely deadlocked over a set of issues, but when you sit people down together and discuss specific interests it turns out the sides are not so far apart. And working through that gives you a much better idea of what real solutions might look like.
|
Unprecedented Times... New Responses.
Support Carpe Diem West’s work with your tax deductible year-end contribution.
Continue this conversation through our In The West blog.
