HomeMy WebLinkAbout10-23-25 Public Comment - N. Nakamura - Community conversation about water neededFrom:Natsuki Nakamura
To:Bozeman Public Comment
Subject:[EXTERNAL]Community conversation about water needed
Date:Wednesday, October 22, 2025 4:50:27 PM
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Please share this with the City Commission and the Urban Parks and Forestry Board in
advance of their meeting.
Dear Urbans Parks & Forestry Board,
You will be receiving the City’s presentation about the Bozeman Water Adequacy initiative(aka WARD).
I am a member of the WARD working group and helped gather the signatures needed to get
this citizens-led initiative on the ballot that is in your mailboxes now.
You can see some of my other comments regarding the City’s presentation here:Regarding the City's slideshow
Regarding the City's feasibility study
I would also like to make some general comments about our water supply, as someone whohas attended many Commission meetings in the last 2 years. I am not as concerned about how
much water exactly we have at this moment, but more about why the City used “worst-casescenario” projections back in 2023, but now uses much more optimistic projections.
In 2023, I watched multiple times the presentation about the need to conserve water, with dire
projections of our demand exceeding supply between 2027 and 2033. This seems veryreasonable to present as justification to adopt more water conservation measures, including
significant turf restrictions in future developments.
This also seems like a very reasonable lead up to the presentation in early 2024 of the idea of apipeline from Canyon Ferry to increase our water supply. Justification for this pipeline
included the need for community resiliency (a shout out to the recently passed Belonging inBozeman plan). The Commission at the time decided to put the Canyon Ferry pipeline back on
the shelf, opting to try many small row boats of water conservation measures instead of the"Titanic" of the pipeline.
Now the City says we have plenty of water, “only” using 43% of our water rights in a normal
year (not including development approved or in the pipeline), and over 60% in a drought year.
Has City staff or the Commission had a conversation about what % of our water rights theyare comfortable with using - 60%, 80%, 99%? At what % usage does the Canyon Ferry
pipeline idea have to come off the shelf? And is that assuming “normal” conditions, or adrought year (which is a matter of when, not if)?
I think we as a community need to have a conversation about how much water are we
comfortable using, what are we conserving water for, and for whom are we building housing?
The Water Adequacy initiative (submitted initially in spring of 2024, and again in spring of2025) pushes these questions to the forefront, rather than kicking the can down the road.
If we continue to build housing that is unaffordable and failing to meet our community’s
housing needs, we will deplete our aquifer and watershed.
It doesn’t matter how many water rights we as a City have if there is no water.
I will be voting yes for the Water Adequacy initiative, and I hope others will join me.
Thank you for your consideration,Natsuki Nakamura