Protect New Mexico's Water Through Science, Law, and Long-Term Stewardship

"Imagine watching the lifeblood of your community disappear."

"Removing those water rights from the village is like removing an artery to your heart, causing a slow death to its vibrant agrarian culture, traditions, and values."

For generations, New Mexico’s acequias have sustained our farms, communities, culture, wildlife, and groundwater. They are living systems that connect neighbors, recharge aquifers, produce local food, and preserve one of North America’s oldest traditions of democratic water governance.

Today, prolonged drought, climate change, groundwater depletion, and increasing pressure to transfer water rights threaten these systems. The proposed Mechenbier 40-acre water transfer in Albuquerque’s South Valley has become a catalyst for a larger conversation about how New Mexico manages its most precious resource.

This petition is not simply about one transfer. It is about ensuring that every major water-transfer decision is guided by science, transparency, New Mexico law, and the long-term public welfare.

Water belongs to the people of New Mexico. As drought intensifies and supplies become less certain, decisions affecting our rivers, aquifers, acequias, farms, domestic wells, and future generations deserve careful scientific review and meaningful public participation.

Acequias do far more than deliver irrigation water. They recharge groundwater, support local agriculture, sustain wildlife, preserve cultural heritage, strengthen community cooperation, and help New Mexico adapt to a changing climate. Protecting them benefits every resident—not only those who own water rights.

We respectfully call upon the New Mexico Office of the State Engineer and the Interstate Stream Commission to:

• Place science, transparency, conservation, and public welfare at the center of every major water-transfer decision.
• Adopt a temporary moratorium—or another appropriate interim policy—on additional Middle Rio Grande water transfers until cumulative impacts can be fully evaluated using the best available science.
• Require applicants to demonstrate that proposed transfers will not impair existing water rights, groundwater sustainability, aquifer recharge, conservation, Rio Grande Compact compliance, or the public welfare.
• Convene a public working group that includes acequia commissioners, Tribal governments, farmers, scientists, local governments, conservation districts, and community organizations to strengthen New Mexico’s long-term water stewardship.

Every generation has a responsibility to protect what sustains life. Water cannot speak for itself. We can.

Please sign and share this petition. Together we can protect New Mexico’s acequias, strengthen responsible water stewardship, and ensure a secure water future for generations to come.

#SpeakForTheWater   #SomosAtrisco