LEUPP, AZ — A proposed water rights settlement for three Native American tribes that carries a price tag larger than any such agreement enacted by Congress has taken a major step forward with its introduction to the Navajo Nation Council.
A landmark 1922 agreement divided the Colorado River basin water among seven Western states but left out tribes. The tribes are seeking water from a mix of sources: the Colorado River, the Little Colorado River, aquifers and washes on tribal lands in northeastern Arizona. "We will have economic opportunities that our tribal members have never seen before, and which will give hope and pride to our people," Preston said.Without a settlement, the tribes would be at the mercy of courts. Already, the U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that the federal government is not bound by treaties with the Navajo Nation to secure water for the tribe.
The costliest one enacted by Congress was for the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes in Montana at $1.9 billion. The Navajo, Hopi and San Juan Southern Paiute tribes are seeking more than $5 billion in their settlement. Arizona — situated in the Colorado River's Lower Basin with California, Nevada and Mexico — is unique in that it also has an allocation in the Upper Basin. Under the settlement terms, Navajo and Hopi would get about 47,000 acre-feet in the Upper Basin — nearly the entire amount that was set aside for use at the Navajo Generating Station, a coal-fired power plant that shut down in late 2019. Navajo previously had agreed not to seek that water for the 50 years prior to 2019.
He said the settlement was significant because of the size and nature of the claims and because it's been decades in the making.
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