TWIN LAKES, N.M. – Water is coming from the San Juan River to thousands of Navajo homes.
The Navajo-Gallup Water Supply Project’s San Juan Lateral is 60% complete.
The Cutter Lateral in Eastern Navajo Agency has been delivering water to 6,200 people in eight chapters since 2020.
With water soon to be on its way, now is a time for families to plan for their home sites and business owners to take out their business plans.
“They should be dusting off any economic development plans they have,” said Bidtah Becker, chief legal counsel for Navajo Nation President Buu Nygren. “And if they don’t have any, they should be developing them because there is a water supply coming to them.”
On Tuesday, the Bureau of Reclamation sponsored a construction update of the Navajo-Gallup Water Supply Project with the Office of the President and Vice President, Navajo Nation Division of Water Resources, Navajo Tribal Utility Authority, the Navajo Nation Water Rights Commission and Department of the Interior officials.
BOR is the federal agency responsible for constructing the 300-mile pipeline, two water treatment plants, 19 pumping stations and various water storage tanks that will deliver water to approximately 250,000 Diné by 2028.
“We are hooking up Navajo communities as we’re building the pipeline, so this water will go to all Navajo communities,” said Bart Deming, a construction engineer managing the project for BOR.
The San Juan Lateral is a water pipeline that runs from Nehnahnezad to Shiprock and along the U.S. Highway 491 corridor to Yatahey, N.M. At this point, the pipeline continues south into Gallup for the Gallup Regional Supply Project and west toward the Navajo Code Talkers Sublateral.
That link will connect water from New Mexico to chapters in Arizona. The chapters in Arizona include St. Michaels and Fort Defiance.
Day two of the water project tour begins with visits to the Frank Chee Willeto Reservoir. That’s where water will be stored and pumped down the San Juan Lateral and Navajo Code Talkers Sublateral.
Dr. Crystal Tulley-Cordova, principal hydrologist for the Navajo Nation Department of Water Resources, said the water project serves 43 chapters in New Mexico. It diversifies the water portfolio for hundreds of thousands of Diné and provides a secure water future for them.
“The Navajo Gallup Water Supply Project brings clean, safe drinking water into Navajo homes, and that’s important for me, especially as someone who was a former water hauler, being able to have generations into the future have access to clean water,” Tulley-Cordova said.
Becker said the Navajos need to know that water is coming. She said projects of this scale require many levels of government from chapters to state and federal partners.
“I think what this project shows is the extra level of work that it takes to get clean drinking water to people,” she said.
