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substantive problems today. We haven't heard much about institutional arrangements to try and deal with them. If we're all going to get away from litigation and cooperate in some fashion, basin-wide or even in the Lower Basin, it seems to me we have to give some serious consideration to new institutional arrange- ments. Some people say, "Well, you're just moving the institutional squares around on the board," but I don't think that's true. I think the more you get all the stakeholders involved in serious discussions about how to deal with these problems, the less likely it is we'll end up litigating. WEATHERFORD: I would add to that list the whole issue of how the municipal imperative, if you will, is going to be addressed in the next century. There's not a lot of water that's really needed. I think I once estimated roughly 1 million acre-feet, and that includes the bulk of Met's need, is all we need on the margin to meet municipal demand through a good part of the next century. That raises the institutional question, "How best do we facilitate this gradual shift in use?" I think we are continuing to have our heads in the sand about the role of private capital. We view the Colorado River Basin as an insular thing. It's certainly a creature of public subsidy. The infrastructure is all public. But the reality is, for the first time, beginning in this decade, we've begun to feel scarcity. We do not have the level of scarcity yet that is required for most markets to operate, but we now can see that level of scarcity coming. And with that scarcity, unavoidably, we're going to be raising the dollar value on water. When you look at the combined collective power of urbanization with respect to bonding and pro- jected rate revenues and at the declining emphasis at the federal level in terms of federal subsidy, it seems to me institutionally, we've got to look at new types of ventures. That may mean some new alignments, as I think Jerry is suggesting. But I see the major problems as being institutional and that covers responding to environmental demands as well. GETCHES: Experts working on Colorado River issues today are understandably focused on the California issue. How do we get California to, as we say, "live within its means?" I think if we were looking back 20 years from now, that question would not seem very important. Nor would issues like salinity. I think that we're going to see, and this was suggested in both Jerry and Gary's remarks, markets playa major role in solving the problems that we're grappling with today. I think the 4.4 problem will be solved by markets. I think that California will never live within its means if that means 4.4. I think markets will facilitate solutions to Indian water problems and by finally getting quantifications and enabling tribes who don't have immediate or economically justifiable uses in their opinion at this point, to lease their water. I think the salinity problem will be solved partly by markets too. Buying out the least productive land in the Wellton-Mohawk Project would eliminate in a single stroke any future need for the Yuma Desalina- tion Plant. The Upper Basin issue that we've always grappled with, how to develop the Compact apportionment, I think will evolve into a problem of how much can you develop consistent with environmental con- straints now that there is a realization that in-stream water actually has a value that exceeds the economic value of water diverted to agriculture. In the Upper Basin, we'll see voluntary and beneficial market transactions that will enable compliance with environmental statutes, be economically beneficial to the Upper Basin states, and help supply the neigh- bors' insatiable thirst down south. There are some problems that are not likely to be solved by markets. One of them is the lack of drought resilience that is in the system for natural systems. Larry MacDonnell and I worked some years ago on a study of what would happen in a severe, sustained drought in the Colorado River Basin and we found that there's an amazing resilience for beneficial consumptive uses under the Law of the River. The soft spot in all this is for natural systems. If there is a severe sustained drought, we will see fish die-offs and dried up wetlands and distressed recreational econo- mies, public lands where trees are dying and that sort of thing. These needs are not accommodated in the present Law of the River. Both the market solutions and these problems that are not likely to be addressed by markets need to be addressed within an institutional nexus. As Jerry said, we've got to start thinking more broadly about that. We need some way to come together and facilitate markets, to develop solutions, and to accommodate all the interests, as well as satisfy changing environ- mental mandates and changing economic demands of all of the states. I've made some suggestions about what those institutions should be but I don't think any particular suggestion is the key. The key is going back to Powell's wisdom that this river and this watershed can be a unifying device, socially and culturally, for the West. If we look at it that way, we'll be led to some kind of different institutional arrangements. THE EVER EVOLVING LAW OF THE RIVER SYMPOSIUM PROCEEDINGS SEPTEMBER 1999 o