President Donald Trump this week nominated Ted Cooke to lead the federal Bureau of Reclamation.
Cooke is the former manager of the Central Arizona Project, whose canals bring water to the Valley. If he’s confirmed by the U.S. Senate, Cooke will have a big role in trying to bring the seven Colorado River basin states to an agreement on new rules for the river — likely including cuts to water allocations.
Cooke’s nomination has largely been praised in Arizona, although water officials in some of the other basin states have expressed concern that he may play favorites, given his ties to Arizona.
Sarah Porter, director of the Kyl Center for Water Policy at Arizona State University, joined The Show to discuss.
Full conversation
MARK BRODIE: What do you make of this nomination? Do you think Ted Cooke's the right person for this job?
SARAH PORTER: I think Ted Cooke is a great choice for this job for a couple of reasons. One, as you mentioned, is that he's really familiar with the issues related to the Colorado River, and we're at a critical time. The seven states that share water from the Colorado River need to come up with a new agreement for how we manage this highly stressed system.
And really they need, they have a matter of months to come up with an agreement and so we need a Bureau of Reclamation commissioner who understands the issues and can hit the ground running. But in addition to that, Ted was the general manager of the Central Arizona Project and so he's very familiar with the kind of on the ground practicalities that all of the stakeholders in the Colorado River discussion live with, so he's a very good choice at this moment as commissioner.
BRODIE: I want to ask you about that familiarity with sort of the day to day situations, but also I wonder if there's an importance in having personal relationships with, you know, some of the water managers in the other basin states.
PORTER: Yeah, I think it is a good thing for them that Ted has relationships. He knows all the negotiators, all the stakeholders. They also know Ted from his role as the lead of one of the major stakeholders in the Colorado River discussions. Clearly there will be concerns that he'll have trouble stepping out of his Arizona Central Arizona role.
And I, you know, I can understand that if the nominee for a commissioner were a major stakeholder from another state, there'd be concerns about that. But I think because people know Ted, they know he's very analytical, very data driven, very much a sort of fair minded individual. I think people will, based on their relationships, people from other states will not have very serious concerns about potential Arizona bias.
BRODIE: Well, it seems as though is aware of what you were just talking about in terms of sort of maybe being a perception that he would play favorites with Arizona or the Lower Basin states, including Arizona and California, but it, I wonder like how big of a topic of discussion might this be at, for example, his confirmation hearing.
PORTER: Well, that the states are really good at leveraging every opportunity that they can in these ongoing negotiations, so potentially I expect that if there are objections, they'll probably be brought up before he actually has to sit down in front of, you know, a Senate committee. And there may be states that are looking to leverage some kind of little benefit for themselves in order, you know, they would not oppose Ted Cooke in exchange for some little concession. That wouldn't be unusual in the Colorado River negotiations, but yeah, I don't think that we can just count on everyone agreeing to Ted Cooke as commissioner without objection.
There there's another, a whole other element that's kind of outside of my wheelhouse, but this is a political appointee by the Trump administration, and so, you know, no doubt there are delegation members from various states who would also apply a more political lens to this beyond the water negotiations, too.
BRODIE: I mean, it kind of wouldn't be the Colorado River Basin negotiations if everybody agreed on everything, right?
PORTER: That's exactly right, and everybody, every single stakeholder needs things, and, and the needs are incredibly diverse and so, you know, they have to take every opportunity to, to, to try to get their needs met.
BRODIE: So the commissioner of the Bureau of Reclamation obviously has things other than the Colorado River to deal with, but I wonder if the fact that the Trump administration has put forward Ted Cooke to lead this agency, does that tell you anything about how the administration is thinking about trying to wrap up these negotiations or the importance maybe it places on on a resolution to this issue?
PORTER: That's how I read it. I read choosing someone like Ted Cooke, who everyone understands can come in and roll up his sleeves and begin making every effort to get the seven states toward an agreement. I see that as an indication that the administration is prioritizing the Colorado River issues among the huge array of responsibilities that the Bureau of Reclamation has.
You know, if you look at a map of the United States, the Bureau of Reclamation manages reservoirs and hydropower facilities and water delivery infrastructure from pretty much the whole western half of the United States, from North Dakota down to Texas and all the way to the Pacific coast.
So that's a, it's hundreds of dams, you know, huge amount of stuff going on beyond the Colorado River, but I think the selection of Ted signals a prioritizing of this very, very critical system.
