Patricia (Pat) Mulroy turns 65 today. I know she's a legend because she's featured on Mike McGuire's This Day in Water History blog for 24 February, along with Robert Fulton.
But I am not kidding; she is a legend in Western water circles and a transformative figure if there ever was one.
Her water legend began when she created the Southern Nevada Water Authority in Las Vegas out of seven smaller agencies who couldn't seem to get along. She convinced them that with one 'super agency' to act as water purveyor to speak with a unified voice for southern Nevada (read 'Clark County and Las Vegas') that all parties would benefit. She was right, became the SNWA's first head, remaining there for 25 years.
As head of the SNWA she was the spokesperson for southern Nevada's water needs. She also became Nevada's point person for the Colorado River Compact (CRC) and related water allocation issues. Virtually all of southern Nevada's water came from the Colorado River Basin (CRB) and Las Vegas' growth was sucking that source dry. She started a outdoor water conservation program that paid people to take out lawns. You didn't need those in a place with about 4 inches of annual rainfall. Indoor conservation? Not so much (return-flow credits?)..
Mulroy soon became a feared advocate for Nevada's CRC water, a paltry 300,000 acre-feet out of a total of 15,000,000 acre-feet for the seven basin states. At the signing of the CRC in 1922, Nevada had about 1.5% of the CRB's population (80K out of almost 6M) and it got just about that fraction of the available (at the time, anyway) water. No one could foresee what Las Vegas would become or the drought that would hammer the CRB.
She was a tough, savvy, and smart negotiator. The famed 'water buffaloes' (OWGs and MAWGs - old and middle-aged white guys) of the Western water world did not faze her. She was criticized at times for being unreasonable, heavy-handed and unrealistic (and she was). I suspect some of that arose from sexism. But I believe there was really grudging admiration for this fashionable woman with the gold lamé slippers who knew so much about Western water and did things differently. There's even a nefarious character (Catherine Case) in Paolo Bacigalupi's dystopian novel The Water Knife that seems based on her.
Many rural Nevadans despised her for the SNWA's plan to pipe groundwater 300 miles from east-central Nevada to slake Clark County's thirst. She even opined about capturing Mississippi River floodwaters and piping them to Las Vegas and other points west. (note: as a former 13-year resident of the Reno area I must point out that the Las Vegas gambling revenues pay for the state income taxes Nevadans avoid).
She was just doing her job, a civil servant following the 'go-go growth' mantra of the region she served. I actually likened her to New York City's Robert Moses (see Mulroy as Moses) another unelected official who left his mark on a major metropolitan area.
Pat has become more collaborative these days...Will wonders never cease! I have to admit that I would love to see her appointed to straighten out the Bay- Delta mess in California. I made that recommendation when I served on the NRC Committee almost 10 years ago. I think her skill set would work where no one else's could. Worth a try.
Here is an excellent article by Matt Jenkins from High Country News. And a three-year old blog post I wrote.
I met Pat on a few occasions. The only time I really had a conversation with her was at La Guardia Airport in 2011. Did we talk about Western water? No - we chatted about whether we would take off on time. We did.
Senior citizen? I don't think so. Elder stateswoman? Yes.
Happy birthday, Pat!
"As God is my witness, I will never be thirsty again." -- apologies to Scarlett O'Hara, Gone With The Wind
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