New Leader, New Direction

Those of you who read this newsletter know I don’t shy away from certain public policy issues. For instance, our water security and planning. There is a direct connection between making the right choices today and what your house may be worth 15 years from now.

So, it’s relevant.

You may recall this article and this article, in which I talk about the future of water in AZ and who bears responsibility for it.

Our most recent governor, despite dire warning from the US government, never really took water conservation seriously. He put forward an incredibly wasteful, pie in the sky plan to build desalination plants in the desert.

He could have considered incentives to change what we farm in the desert from high water use alfalfa and cotton to lower water use plants. He could have spent much less money bolstering infrastructure that will recycle water from our cities and towns to refill our aquifers and reservoirs.

But this is conservation and he seems averse to that. It’s hard politically.

That’s why I’m hopeful that our new governor, Katie Hobbs, will take a new direction.

Full disclosure. I helped edit her “Resilient Arizona” plan, which speaks to the importance of working on land, energy and water policy comprehensively.

It’s a great start.

So, please watch this space and watch what our new governor does. She has a lot of opposition from the same forces (realtors, home builders, developers, farmers and ideologically-driven legislators) who have created this mess.

She will need our help, as home owner or prospective home owners, to say that we need policies that will protect our investments for our future generations.