New CAP general manager optimistic about agreement on Colorado River water cuts

1 looming deadline: Burman tells Axios Phoenix that the Bureau of Reclamation plans to issue a draft of a supplement to a 2007 environmental impact statement (EIS) on Colorado River conditions in March or April and that it needs data from the basin states in February.

Context: Burman says CAP will then have a better idea of what the bureau could impose on the basin states if they can't agree on conservation measures.

• CAP spokesperson DeEtte Person said the supplemental EIS is a necessary step for modifying the operations guidelines for Glen Canyon Dam and Hoover Dam, if necessary.
• Those dams created Lake Mead and Lake Powell, which are critical reservoirs for Colorado River water.

Catch up quick: Arizona has already taken multiple rounds of cuts to its allocation of Colorado River water under the auspices of a Drought Contingency Plan (DCP) that it signed onto in 2019.

• The bureau announced last year that Arizona would have to take a cut of 592,000 acre-feet, or 21%, of its allotment from the Colorado River.

What they're saying: "I am confident in an outcome in which Brenda is going to be sitting next to me at a table in discussions with the federal government, the basin states, the tribes, the NGOs," Arizona Department of Water Resources director Tom Buschatzke said.

• Burman's experience as the Bureau of Reclamation commissioner means she has preexisting relationships with many of the stakeholders as she comes into the job, he said.