With their taps cut off, residents of the affected neighborhood, the Palo Verde Foothills, have seen water bills rise from roughly $220 to almost $700 a month, in some cases even topping $1,000, to account for scarcity and the longer distances that water delivery trucks are now being forced to drive,.
"We're really hoping we don't go dry by summer," Joe McCue, a Palo Verde Foothills inhabitant who's installing a rainwater collection system, told theWhile the situation in the Palo Verde Foothills, which has rendered residents without necessities like reliable fire protection, is certainly dire, it's more complicated than meets the eye. Much of the area's development is actually fairly new — and arguably shouldn't exist.
on Scottsdale's government site, "especially given the requirements of the City’s mandated drought plan." But regardless of who's at fault, the fact remains: an entire desert community has had their taps cut off. Jury's still out on how many other Southwestern towns might follow. "We can't just protect every single person who buys a parcel and builds a home," Sarah Porter, director of the Kyl Center for Water Policy at Arizona State University, told the
Still mostly desert?