This event begins at 7:00pm Arizona/Pacific Time.
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A timely discussion among leaders in Colorado River Basin water resource management about moving forward as a river community. This year’s pandemic has highlighted the need for access to clean water. While Tribes hold senior water rights, they are often denied water infrastructure. The river environment and the unique flora and fauna it supports are often similarly sidelined. While States fight amongst themselves for already overallocated water resources, our panelists are forcing the larger issue: we are all part of the Colorado River community, and solutions need to include everyone. This discussion will conclude with an audience Q & A.
Panelists:
Bidtah Becker is a citizen of the Navajo Nation (NN) and is currently serving as an Associate Attorney for the Navajo Tribal Utility Authority. Ms. Becker's career has focused on natural resources with an emphasis in water. In July 2019, Governor Lujan Grisham appointed Ms. Becker to serve on the New Mexico Interstate Stream Commission and she is also active on the Leadership Team for the Water and Tribes Initiative in the Colorado River Basin. Prior, she served as the Executive Director of the NN Division of Natural Resources (May 2015 to January 2019). From 2002 to 2015, Ms. Becker served in the Navajo Nation Department of Justice (NNDOJ) (2002 to 2015) where she worked as an attorney across three different units: Human Services and Government, Water Rights, and Natural Resources. The majority of her NNDOJ career was in water rights. Ms. Becker is happily married and Mom to 15 year old Bahe and 11 year old Tazbah. She lives with her family in Fort Defiance, Navajo Nation.
Anne Castle is a senior fellow at the Getches-Wilkinson Center for Natural Resources, Energy, and the Environment at the University of Colorado Law School, focusing on western water issues including Colorado River operational policy and the integration of water and land use planning. She is a founding member of the Water Policy Group, comprised of select water sector experts who have been decision makers and trusted advisers within governments and international bodies handling complex water policy and strategy. From 2009 to 2014, she was Assistant Secretary for Water and Science at the U.S. Department of the Interior where she oversaw water and science policy for the Department and had responsibility for the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation and the U.S. Geological Survey. Castle is a recovering lawyer, having practiced water law for 28 years with the Rocky Mountain law firm of Holland & Hart where she chaired the Management Committee and Natural Resources Department. She serves on boards or advisory committees for Western Resource Advocates, Colorado Legal Services, the Colorado Water Trust, the Salazar Center for North American Conservation, the Airborne Snow Observatory, Stanford University’s Water in the West program, and the Colorado River Water and Tribes Initiative.
John (Jack) Schmidt is the Janet Quinney Lawson Chair in Colorado River Studies at Utah State University where he leads the Center for Colorado River Studies and the Future of the Colorado River Project. Jack served as Chief of the U.S. Geological Survey Grand Canyon Monitoring and Research Center between 2011 and 2014. Jack has contributed 35 years of applied science concerning the geomorphology of the Colorado River in Grand Canyon and elsewhere in the Colorado River watershed. In both his university research and government agency leadership, Jack has worked to encourage collaboration among federal and state agencies, tribal interests, non-governmental organization and academic institutions. Jack was awarded the National Park Service Director’s Award for Natural Resource Research for his career of applied science study of the large regulated rivers of the National Park system in 2009. Link in the agenda: https://qcnr.usu.edu/coloradoriver/
Darryl Vigil is the co-director of Water & Tribes in the Colorado River Basin. He is Jicarilla Apache, Jemez Pueblo, Zia Pueblo, and currently serves as the Water Administrator, Jicarilla Apache Nation; Chair, Water is Life a Tribal Partnership; official spokesperson (and past chair) for the Colorado River Ten Tribes Partnership; member of the Coordination Committee of the Next Steps of the Colorado River Basin Supply Demand Study; member of the Navajo Gallup Water Supply Project Planning, Construction and Operation Committees; member of the Coordination Committee of the San Juan River Recovery and Restoration Project; past Secretary/Treasurer and Board of Trustees of the Colorado River Water Users Association; past Chair, Board of the Jicarilla Apache Utility Authority; past President/CEO, Apache Nugget Corporation the Jicarilla Apache Nation’s Gaming Enterprise.
Moderator:
Jason Robison is a Professor at the University of Wyoming College of Law. His writing and teaching revolve around water, public lands, and Native Americans in the American West. He is lead editor of the volume created for the 1869 Powell Expedition’s sesquicentennial, Vision & Place: John Wesley Powell & Reimagining the Colorado River Basin, as well as a forthcoming volume being prepared for the 1922 Colorado River Compact’s centennial—tentatively entitled, Cornerstone: A Century of the Colorado River Compact. Professor Robison also authors the long-running treatise Law of Water Rights & Resources. He is honored to be a member of the Leadership Team for the Water & Tribes Initiative in the Colorado River Basin.
