Old timers who manage ditches, head gates, and canals often mention the “head of water.” It refers, somewhat imprecisely, to an amount of water needed to force its movement over various distances. A bigger hayfield requires a bigger “head of water” to irrigate it all the way to the bottom, and a bigger turbine at […]

President Jimmy Carter’s Office of Management and Budget Director, Bert Lance, is best remembered for a corruption scandal involving Calhoun National Bank. But he is also the one who popularized the corny phrase, “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.” “That’s the trouble with government,” he wrote, “Fixing things that aren’t broken, and not fixing […]

Bureau of Reclamation Commissioner Camille Touton recently told a Senate Committee the government must reassess its management of the Colorado River Basin, because of unprecedented drought. She cited the historically low levels of both Lake Powell and Lake Mead, though her testimony was long on drama and short on plans. In fact, she offered no […]