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🗓️ 10 September 2021
⏱️ 18 minutes
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0:00.0 | This event is being recorded, so please take that into consideration if you choose to participate. |
0:09.2 | On August 16, the Bureau of Reclamation, the part of the Interior Department that manages |
0:14.2 | water in the Western U.S., held a press conference online. |
0:18.8 | I'm honored to introduce the Assistant Secretary for Water and Science, Ms. Tony Trujillo, |
0:24.0 | to discuss 2022 operations. |
0:26.8 | The virtual press conference had all the stilted aesthetics of pandemic life. |
0:30.8 | Government officials on video chat, long pauses, an awkward script reading. |
0:36.5 | Good afternoon. I'm Tonya Trujillo, the Assistant Secretary for Water and Science at the Department |
0:42.5 | of the Interior. |
0:43.7 | Trujillo's monotone introduction didn't capture the gravity of what she was there to say. |
0:48.8 | For the first time in the 99 years that the government has been keeping records, |
0:53.9 | they were declaring a water shortage on the Colorado River, a river that 40 million Americans |
1:00.3 | rely on. We are seeing the effects of climate change in the Colorado River basin through extended |
1:06.4 | drought, extreme temperatures, expansive wildfires, and in some places flooding and landslides, |
1:13.8 | and now is the time to take action to respond to them. |
1:17.2 | Starting in January, farmers, ranchers, and irrigation districts will be forced to use less water. |
1:26.8 | Arizona will be hit particularly hard. |
1:30.9 | For people who've been watching the Colorado for years, like |
1:33.8 | ProPublica Reporter Abram Lesgarden, this shortage was entirely predictable. |
1:39.3 | Do you ever feel like Cassandra? |
1:41.8 | I don't know how to answer that. I mean, I'd like to try to look around corners a little bit |
1:48.8 | with what I'm hearing from the climate community and the environment community. |
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