The Southwest Under Stress

Southwest Under Stress examines the development-environment conflict in the four contiguous states of Arizona, Utah, Colorado, and New Mexico. It emphasizes three issues with implications that extend far beyond the Southwest: water---its quantity, quality, and allocation; environment---how and to what extent it should be preserved; and the future of Native American and other poverty-stricken peoples. Energy comes in for special attention because the Southwest is a principal repository of fossil and nuclear fuels. This book serves as a guide for public policy in the region, and many of the policy alternatives set out are aimed at state and local governments. Alleviating poverty, improving the lot of Native Americans, and formulating workable water, environmental, and natural resources development policies are all of special concern to the region, but the federal government has asserted a dominant role in may of these areas. The book discusses ways in which the federal role may change to improve both federal policy itself and cooperation with other levels of government.

First published in 1980, the first volume of Energy Development in the Southwest analyses four potential energy development scenarios for the Four Corner states (i.e., Arizona, Colorado, New Mexico, Utah, and Wyoming) and for the Upper Colorado River Basin, based on alternative national energy scenarios and attempts to assess some of the economic, demographic, and environmental impacts of each development scenario. The energy development scenarios considered in this book involve coal development and use, oil share production, and uranium mining and milling. This title will be of particular interest to students of Environmental Science.

This book explores how and why prehistoric Southwestern societies changed in complexity, and offers important new perspectives on evolution of culture. It discusses the factors that made prehistoric Southwesterners vulnerable to an arid environment, and their strategies to lessen risk and stress.

Southwest Under Stress examines the development-environment conflict in the four contiguous states of Arizona, Utah, Colorado, and New Mexico. It emphasizes three issues with implications that extend far beyond the Southwest: water---its quantity, quality, and allocation; environment---how and to what extent it should be preserved; and the future of Native American and other poverty-stricken peoples. Energy comes in for special attention because the Southwest is a principal repository of fossil and nuclear fuels. This book serves as a guide for public policy in the region, and many of the policy alternatives set out are aimed at state and local governments. Alleviating poverty, improving the lot of Native Americans, and formulating workable water, environmental, and natural resources development policies are all of special concern to the region, but the federal government has asserted a dominant role in may of these areas. The book discusses ways in which the federal role may change to improve both federal policy itself and cooperation with other levels of government.

This book is focused exclusively on water problems in the 48 U.S. states. The authors provide an accessible overview of the work of many federal, state and academic researchers and water system administrators whose investigations have focused on the state of water and the water crisis now accelerating in the United States. David McNabb and Carl Swenson seek to bring to a wider audience some of the current research findings and data on the perilous state of the United States’ surface and groundwater resources during this time of climate change and the extreme drought taking place in many sections of the nation. Descriptions of the water resource systems are based on research and the subsequent findings published by water scientists in the United States Geological Survey, the Environmental Protection Agency, the U.S. Corps of Engineers and water related agencies of the Departments of Agriculture and of the Interior and state and local water management agencies.

Cities can no longer meet service demands. Highways and water supply systems are increasingly inadequate; the quality of local health care and education has never been lower. These are problems which are germane to cities new or old, growing or declining, Sunbelt or Frostbelt.Thirty top urban affairs and municipal finance experts focus on the issues and approaches to the major financial problems facing cities in the 1980s. In these invited essays demographic changes, regional economic shifts, inflation, voter resistance and changing intergovernmental roles are viewed each for their impact on the capacity of cities to finance public services.The book is essential reading for city managers, business administrators, public officials, planners, planning board members and those interested in the future viability of American cities.