In early January, the unthinkable happened for hundreds of households in the Rio Verde suburb of Phoenix: Their water was cut off. Families in the cactus-pocked desert foothills were forced to skip showers, use paper plates, and haul laundry elsewhere. The nearby city of Scottsdale had supplied water deliveries to the community for years, but officials there decided they had to conserve more water to serve their own residents.
Amid historic western water shortages and a 20-year drought, for years some have expressed interest in helping meet demand for water where there is not enough to go around: Native American tribes. The reality, however, is that outdated federal law prevents many tribes from leasing their water off reservation.
