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Water Rights/Research Log

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Open questions

Things we could not confirm, and how to close them. Append new sections; do not rewrite existing ones.

Arizona open questions

Logged July 24, 2026 while writing ../02-arizona/. Each item says what I could not confirm and how to close it.

Dates I could not pin down

  1. October 27, 2025 as the date the ADWR Director “initiated AMAActive Management AreaAn Arizona zone where groundwater pumping is actually regulated: metered, reported, and capped. Outside these zones there historically were no limits at all. designation procedures” for the Ranegras Plain. The ADWR press release of January 12, 2026 cites an informational public meeting on October 15, 2025 and a formal hearing on December 18, 2025, with no separate initiation date. The docs use the sourced dates. Close this by pulling the Findings, Decision and Order itself from ADWR, which should recite the procedural history.

  2. Exact date of Judge Minder’s order denying Fondomonte’s stay motion. The AG press release is dated Friday, May 15, 2026 but says the order issued “today, May 12, 2026.” KJZZ reports it issued Thursday, which would be May 14. Docs say “May 12 to 15, 2026.” Close by pulling the minute entry from the Maricopa County Superior Court docket.

  3. The Gila River adjudicationadjudicationA court proceeding that sorts out every water claim on a river system at once. Arizona's has been running since 1974 and still is not finished.’s true filing date. Sources variously say petitions began in the 1970s, the legislature amended procedures in April 1979, the Maricopa County case was initiated in 1979, and the Arizona Supreme Court consolidated in November 1981. WRRC marked “51 years” in 2025, implying a 1974 start. Docs say “filed in the 1970s.” Close by checking the ADWR adjudicationadjudicationA court proceeding that sorts out every water claim on a river system at once. Arizona's has been running since 1974 and still is not finished. history page or the Special Master’s records.

Numbers with an unresolved range

  1. Share of Arizona land area outside AMAsActive Management AreaAn Arizona zone where groundwater pumping is actually regulated: metered, reported, and capped. Outside these zones there historically were no limits at all.. Credible sources give 75, 80 and 87 percent depending on date and on whether INAsIrrigation Non-Expansion AreaA lighter Arizona designation that freezes how much land can be irrigated without imposing full pumping regulation. are counted. The docs present the range in a table rather than picking one. Close by finding a current ADWR GIS acreage figure that accounts for Douglas (2022), Willcox (2024) and Ranegras Plain (2026).

  2. Number of statutory groundwater transportation basinsgroundwater transportation basinSpecific Arizona basins that the law allows water to be pumped out of and moved to a city. Butler Valley is one, which is why leasing it to a foreign hay grower caused an uproar., 4 or 5. A.R.S. Article 8.1 contains 5 transportation provisions (§§ 45-552, 45-553, 45-554, 45-555, 45-555.01). The 1991 Groundwater Transportation Act carved out 4 (McMullen Valley, Butler Valley, Harquahala INAIrrigation Non-Expansion AreaA lighter Arizona designation that freezes how much land can be irrigated without imposing full pumping regulation., Big Chino); the upper San Pedro to Douglas AMA provision came later. The Governor’s office says 5, ASU says 4. Docs explain both. Close by checking the session law history of § 45-555.01.

  3. Butler Valley as a share of Fondomonte’s La Paz County holdings. The brief for this module said “roughly 1/3.” My arithmetic from sourced acreage (3,520 Butler Valley state acres against 3,604 freehold + 3,088 Ranegras state farm + 3,163 state grazing) gives roughly a quarter to a third depending on whether grazing land counts. Docs state the range and show the components. Close by getting a current Fondomonte holdings inventory, if one is public.

  4. Al Dahra’s actual groundwater withdrawals. The widely cited 15,000 to 16,000 acre-feetacre-footEnough water to cover 1 acre a foot deep: 325,851 gallons. Roughly what 2 or 3 suburban households use in a year. per year is a neighboring farmer’s estimate extrapolated from his own operation, not a measurement. Nobody metered McMullen Valley. Close only if McMullen Valley is ever designated an AMA and reporting begins.

  5. Fondomonte’s pumping after 2023. The 31,196 acre-feetacre-footEnough water to cover 1 acre a foot deep: 325,851 gallons. Roughly what 2 or 3 suburban households use in a year. figure is from the AG’s complaint and covers 2023 only. No later figure is public. First mandatory Ranegras Plain reports are due in 2027 for calendar 2026, so a verified number should exist in 2027.

Live and likely to change

  1. Post-2026 Colorado River operating guidelines. As of July 24, 2026 there is no 7-state agreement and no record of decision. Reclamation’s preferred alternative is a 10-year framework issuing 2-year operating plans, with the final EIS and ROD promised for mid to late summer 2026 covering 2027 and 2028. Interior has floated Lower Basin cuts up to 3 million acre-feet. Recheck monthly; this affects every Arizona water number in the module.

  2. Whether the Upper Basin is in CompactcompactA binding agreement between states that Congress approves. Once approved it becomes federal law and overrides conflicting state rules. The Great Lakes Compact is one. breach. CAPCentral Arizona ProjectThe 336 mile canal carrying Colorado River water to Phoenix and Tucson. Arizona agreed to stand last in line for that water, so this is what gets cut first in a shortage.’s Brenda Burman stated in May 2026 that the Upper Basin is “in a definite breach of the CompactcompactA binding agreement between states that Congress approves. Once approved it becomes federal law and overrides conflicting state rules. The Great Lakes Compact is one. by Sept. 30 of 2026.” That is an advocacy position from a Lower Basin entity, not an adjudicated fact. Litigation over Upper Basin delivery obligations is widely expected. Track it.

  3. Whether the Ranegras Plain AMA designation gets challenged. AP noted in January 2026 that the designation is subject to administrative or judicial challenge. No challenge was found as of July 2026. Search the ADWR administrative docket and Maricopa County filings.

  4. Merits of the nuisance theory. Judge Minder has not ruled on whether A.R.S. § 13-2917 applies to lawful groundwater pumping at all. This is the doctrinally interesting question in the case, and there is no Arizona appellate authority squarely on it that I found. If Arizona holds that overpumping is a public nuisance, that is a much bigger deal than the AMA.

  5. Ranegras Plain management goal and management plan. Not yet developed as of July 2026. ADWR estimates roughly 2 years. The conservation requirements are where the real constraint on Fondomonte will land, and they do not exist yet.

  6. ADWR rulemaking for Ag-to-Urban. SB 1611 required the Director to adopt program rules by June 30, 2026. I did not confirm whether that deadline was met. Check the Arizona Administrative Register.

  7. Status of Fondomonte’s appeal of the 640-acre lease cancellation. Pending as of March 2024, with no later reporting found. The lease terminated on February 14, 2024 regardless of the outcome, so the appeal may be moot or may concern damages.

Wisconsin items raised in the comparison doc

  1. Current DNR posture on cumulative impact review for high capacity wellshigh capacity wellIn Wisconsin, a well (or all wells on 1 property combined) capable of pumping 100,000 gallons a day or more. These need DNR approval. An ordinary house well does not.. The sequence runs Lake Beulah (2011 WI 54), 2011 Act 21 creating Wis. Stat. § 227.10(2m), OAG-01-16 (2016) reading Act 21 to strip the authority, then Clean Wisconsin v. DNR (2021) restoring it. I did not verify the DNR’s operative guidance as of 2026. This belongs to the Wisconsin module; flag it there.

  2. Whether the 100,000 gallons per day threshold has changed. Verified against the DNR site as of July 2026, but the underlying rule is NR 812NR 812Wisconsin's well construction code. Wells drilled decades ago often do not meet it, especially on casing depth and grouting..09(4) and the statutory hooks are in Wis. Stat. ch. 281. Reverify before relying on it in a transaction.

  3. Results of the 2017 Act 10 Central SandsCentral SandsA sandy farming region in central Wisconsin with heavy irrigation. It is the epicenter of the state's groundwater drawdown fights. lake study (Pleasant, Plainfield and Long lakes). Not researched. Relevant to how Wisconsin thinks about cumulative drawdowndrawdownHow far the water level drops while a pump is running..

Wisconsin open questions

Raised July 24, 2026 while writing docs/03-wisconsin-great-lakes/. Items 16, 17 and 18 above are partly answered in that module; these are what remains.

Law and doctrine

  1. Has any Wisconsin appellate court construed Wis. Stat. 281.34(5m) directly since 2021? Clean Wisconsin v. DNR, 2021 WI 72 restored DNR’s authority to consider cumulative impacts, but 281.34(5m) (created by 2013 Wis. Act 20, effective July 1, 2014) still says a person may not challenge an approval on the ground that DNR failed to consider them. Those are different questions and the 2021 decisions did not resolve the second. Searched, found no case. A Westlaw or Lexis citator run on 281.34(5m) would settle it.

  2. DNR’s operative internal guidance on cumulative impact review as of 2026. DNR issued a post-Clean Wisconsin statement in 2021, but I did not locate a current written guidance document, checklist, or program directive telling reviewers when to require monitoring or deny. Ask DNR’s Drinking Water and Groundwater Program directly.

  3. Whether the 2021 Central SandsCentral SandsA sandy farming region in central Wisconsin with heavy irrigation. It is the epicenter of the state's groundwater drawdown fights. Lakes Study recommendations were ever adopted. DNR recommended a regional groundwater management approach for Pleasant, Long and Plainfield lakes. I found no evidence of implementing legislation or rulemaking. Confirm with DNR before treating the study as operative policy.

  4. The scope of “regularly recurring basis” in the Wisconsin navigabilitynavigable in factWisconsin's test for whether a waterway is public. Roughly: can a small recreational boat float on it on a regularly recurring basis. A lot of modest creeks qualify. test. The doctrinal test is well settled (Muench, Diana Shooting Club), but the field application to intermittent or seasonal channels is fact-specific and mostly resolved at the DNR district level rather than in published opinions. There is no public database of DNR navigabilitynavigable in factWisconsin's test for whether a waterway is public. Roughly: can a small recreational boat float on it on a regularly recurring basis. A lot of modest creeks qualify. determinations that I could find. If one exists, it belongs in the agency directory doc.

  5. Whether a county may adopt shoreland standards stricter than NR 115 for any purpose after 2015 Wis. Act 55. The Act made state standards a ceiling for shoreland zoningshoreland zoningCounty rules controlling what you can build within 1,000 feet of a lake or 300 feet of a river. They set your setbacks, your buffer, and how much of the lot you can pave., but counties still regulate through other authorities (floodplain, sanitary, subdivision). The boundary between what Act 55 preempts and what survives under a different grant of authority is unclear from secondary sources. A Wisconsin land use attorney should answer this.

Facts I could not confirm

  1. French Island / Town of Campbell permanent water supply status. Bottled water and point-of-use filtration have been provided since 2021. Whether a municipal connection has been funded and built, and whether any settlement with the City of La Crosse or the airport has closed, is not confirmed as of July 2026.

  2. Wisconsin Water Well Association official URL. wiwwa.com resolves in a browser but blocks automated requests, and I could not confirm it is the current official domain. Left flagged in the agency directory.

  3. Whether the Vantage / OpenAI Port Washington campus water figures will hold at full buildout. The published 22,000 gallons per day peak assumes closed-loop cooling across all phases. The campus is approaching 1 GW. Public filings do not break out water demand per phase. Watch the PSC docket and the Vantage campus FAQ.

  4. Microsoft’s actual metered water use at Mount Pleasant. Projections range from under 3 million gallons in 2026 to 8.4 million gallons per year at full operation. Racine Water Utility bills the site, but municipal customer usage is not published at the account level. Midwest Environmental Advocates is litigating for related records.

  5. Total contracted water capacity for data centers in the Lake Michigan basin. No agency publishes this. The Alliance for the Great Lakes 2025 report and the IJC 2025 review both flagged the gap without filling it. This is the single most useful missing number for judging Compact stress.

  6. Whether NR 140 numeric groundwater standards for PFASPFASThe "forever chemicals" from firefighting foam and industrial processes. They do not break down, treatment is expensive and permanent, and standards keep tightening. Never in a standard water test unless you ask for it by name. will clear the REINS Act cost threshold. DG-02-25 has been blocked because the estimated compliance cost exceeds $10 million over 2 years, which under 2017 Wis. Act 57 requires separate legislative authorization. No bill has passed. Private well owners have no enforceable groundwater standard in the meantime.

  7. Great Lakes Compact Council response to the IJC’s 2025 recommendation 14 on data centers. The IJC recommended the Council address data center demand. Whether the Council has docketed it is unconfirmed.

Verification tasks before any purchase

  1. Whether DNR publishes historical OHWMordinary high water markThe physical line on a shoreline showing where water regularly reaches. On a Wisconsin lake your private property stops there and the state owns the bed below it. The DNR decides where the line is, not your deed. determinations searchably. I found the guidance document and the request process but no lookup of past determinations by parcel. If none exists, the only route is a DNR service center request, which should be priced into a due diligence timeline.

  2. Private well nitratenitrateFertilizer and manure that has leached into groundwater. Above 10 milligrams per liter it is a health risk, especially for infants, and you cannot fix your neighbor's fields. and PFASPFASThe "forever chemicals" from firefighting foam and industrial processes. They do not break down, treatment is expensive and permanent, and standards keep tightening. Never in a standard water test unless you ask for it by name. testing turnaround and cost in 2026. The certified lab list is public; current pricing and turnaround are not. Call 2 labs before scheduling an inspection contingencycontingencyA condition written into a purchase contract that lets you walk away if something checks out badly. Drafting these well costs an hour of attorney time and is the cheapest protection in the whole process..

Research demo, not legal advice. Facts current as of July 2026. Water law is state-specific and moves quickly, so confirm anything you plan to act on with a licensed attorney and the relevant state agency.