Governing Like A River Basin
With cities, farms, and industry across seven states competing over river flows that are dwindling due to climate change, the Colorado River Basin faces some serious long-term problems. Fixing them will require a basin-wide vision with broad public support—and probably a deep pocketbook as well. But many of the stakeholders who will be essential to building that vision and support have a limited voice in the current decision making processes that determine who gets how much water when. How can the basin even agree on, or implement, a viable set of solutions when it faces governance challenges like these?
One answer is to look at how other river basins have done it. The new Carpe Diem West policy brief, Governing Like a River Basin: Options for Expanded Stakeholder Engagement in the Colorado River Basin, examines four examples of stakeholder engagement processes that have successfully been used in large U.S. river basins facing long-term resource management challenges. The brief discusses how these models might be used in conjunction with the Bureau of Reclamation’s Basin Study to build consensus for a set of long-term solutions to the water management challenges facing the Colorado River. The brief also suggests how a basinwide stakeholder engagement process could help secure the broad-based political support and funding necessary to implement that set of solutions.
Prepared in partnership with the University of Montana’s Center for Natural Resources and Environmental Policy, this policy brief is intended to start a larger conversation about how broader stakeholder collaboration can help water interests across the spectrum build a more secure water future for the Colorado River Basin.
Preface - Broader Stakeholder Engagement - A Means to an End
Confluence December 2011 - Perspectives on Stakeholder Engagement from Bob Johnson and Bill Rinne
Learn more about Carpe Diem West’s Colorado River work here.
Join the discussion through our In The West blog.
