Marana Is Running as if in Stage 2 Drought and Faces a 14% Colorado River Cut in 2027; Staff Want New Triggers, Town Lands First AAA Rating

MARANA — The town has been operating as though it were in a Stage 2 drought without formally declaring one, and its Colorado River deliveries will be cut 14% in 2027 and 2028, water staff told the Town Council on Sept. 15. Staff asked the council for direction on rewriting the 2023 Drought Preparedness Plan so that a declaration no longer hinges on Lake Mead's elevation, and said a revised plan will return after the holidays. The same night, Town Manager Terry Rozema announced Marana's first-ever AAA bond rating, the finance director reported year-end revenues above budget in every major fund, and the council approved a five-year deal to bank 2,364 acre-feet of water a year with the Cortaro Water Users' Association starting in 2027. Vice Mayor Roxanne Ziegler presided in Mayor Jon Post's absence; Council Member John Officer was excused.

Drought Plan: Swap the Lake Mead Trigger for a Local One

The town's water resources administrator said the current plan has four drought stages, each tied to a local indicator (the year-over-year change in groundwater levels across the service area's wells) and a regional one (Lake Mead's elevation under the federal 2007 interim guidelines and 2019 drought contingency plan). Either indicator alone can trigger a stage. On the local side, the service-area water table rose 0.28 feet in 2025, which staff credited to decades of recharge and underground storage; that calls for no declaration. On the regional side, the Bureau of Reclamation's August 2025 study projected Lake Mead at 1,056 feet on Jan. 1, 2026, a Tier 2 shortage that under the current plan would require a Stage 2 declaration.

Rather than declare, staff said the town has been meeting Stage 2's measures anyway: a push for a 10% cut in water use at town properties, achieved largely through parks changes such as push-button activators on splash pads and turf removal under the parks master plan, plus public messaging on overseeding, fountains, pools and irrigating between 8 p.m. and 8 a.m. Stage 3 would bring a declared water emergency, a ban on potable water for construction, two-day-a-week irrigation limits, a possible drought surcharge and a 15% cut at town properties; Stage 4 would add a possible moratorium on permits for new water-consuming uses and one-day-a-week irrigation limited to trees and shrubs.

Staff's proposed changes: replace the Lake Mead trigger, whose underlying guidelines expire at the end of 2026, with an indicator based on how many years remain before the town must rely on the Central Arizona Groundwater Replenishment District to replace the groundwater it pumps; require both the local and regional indicators to be met before a stage is declared, instead of either one; and spell out how the higher-stage measures would actually be enforced. Staff said the post-2026 river operating guidelines cover only 10 years with two-year adjustment windows, which makes the Lake Mead figure too volatile to plan around.

A staff depletion scenario, which assumes the town acquires no new renewable supplies, showed the groundwater allowance and long-term storage credit account running down under 14% cuts to municipal and industrial Colorado River deliveries in 2027 and 2028 and an assumed 35% cut from 2029 on. Pressed by Council Member Patrick Cavanaugh, staff said only the 14% figure is firm; the 35% is a planning assumption, not a forecast. Staff said the Arizona Water Bank Authority will cover the 327 acre-feet lost to the 2027 cut with long-term storage credits, so the town will effectively receive its full allocation next year. Reaching the end of the depletion curve would not mean running out of water, staff said, but paying for more expensive replenishment water.

Cavanaugh also asked about the 4,800 acre-feet of Fort McDowell Yavapai Nation Indian-priority water the town will import in 2027 under a one-year lease. Staff called it critically important: wet water for the aquifer, storage credits, and a relationship with a partner whose own Colorado River cut is about 10% and that has water to spare. The town wants the option to renew for 2028.

Council Member Herb Kai asked for figures on water used per vehicle at commercial car washes and suggested they be part of any restrictions; staff said the drive-through washes recirculate water and discharge to the sanitary sewer, and promised numbers. Kai also asked about a drought surcharge; staff said none has been designed. Council Member Patti Comerford asked that the town post a phone number in public restrooms so residents can report running toilets and faucets on town property, and asked parks staff to consider artificial turf for the town hall courtyard. Rozema said a one-page water fact sheet for residents, which Ziegler requested, is on schedule and will condense a podcast recorded with water staff three or four weeks ago.

First AAA Rating; Year-End Revenues Above Budget in Every Major Fund

Rozema said Marana has received a AAA bond rating for the first time, one of five Arizona communities to hold one, and credited the council's spending decisions and the finance staff. Finance Director Yiannis Kalaitzidis then presented preliminary, unaudited results for the fiscal year that ended June 30: general fund revenues came in better than budgeted, the highway user revenue and transportation funds were just above target, the bed tax fund was on budget and hotel sales tax beat projections. The water fund showed revenue at 122% of budget, most of it PFAS legal settlements; the town has received about $3.7 million in such settlements to date and plans to spend all of it on PFAS-related water quality projects. Spending landed where expected, with the highway user revenue fund at about 60% because pavement preservation carried into the new fiscal year, and the water and water reclamation funds showing low spending because their capital projects are still under way.

Cortaro Water Storage Deal Approved

The council approved without opposition a five-year agreement with the Cortaro Water Users' Association to store 2,364 acre-feet of water a year beginning in calendar 2027, accruing long-term storage credits one-for-one. Staff had pulled the item from a prior consent agenda because the storage volume was not yet in the contract. Cavanaugh asked whether the irrigation district keeps any share of the credits; staff said the town earns them one-for-one, though some storage sites charge a fee or pay the town, depending on the location.

Consent: $2 Million PFAS Design Grant, RTA Agreement, Contractor Settlement

The consent agenda passed without discussion. It included a grant agreement with the Water Infrastructure Finance Authority of Arizona for up to $2 million to design the Pioneer Well PFAS Project; an intergovernmental transportation funding agreement with the Regional Transportation Authority of Pima County for delivery of RTA plan elements; a settlement and release ending the town's lawsuit against Barker Contracting Inc., Clear Contracting Company and Arizona Communication Experts Inc. in Pima County Superior Court (case C20236109); a license agreement with the U.S. Department of Energy's Western Area Power Administration allowing new water infrastructure for the Picture Rocks Interconnect Project inside an existing transmission-line easement; the appointment of Richard Glenn as a magistrate pro tempore for the Marana Municipal Court; and ratification of a temporary parking license with Marana Owner LLC.

Development: Quiet Month, Walmart Still a Walmart, Interchange Ahead of Schedule

Development services staff reported 34 single-family residential permits issued through Sept. 15, against 66 for all of September 2025, with 223 permits of all kinds issued over the past month and about 1,500 inspections a month. The only new commercial submittal was Christian Brothers Automotive, filed Sept. 10 for a site in Arizona Pavilions next to Kohl's. An annexation and rezoning request off Cortaro Road remains under review, and staff said pre-application meetings with interested parties continue, though not all become formal submittals. Comerford asked whether the Walmart proposed on Tangerine Road, submitted June 11 with a fuel station, is really a Walmart given neighborhood rumors of a Sam's Club; staff said every application and plan on file says Walmart.

Comerford raised freight traffic from Shamrock Foods and other large employers at the Tangerine Road and Interstate 10 interchange. Rozema said the interchange is scheduled to finish in March and is ahead of that schedule, and that Shamrock, like Amazon, is expected to run trucks outside rush hour. Comerford said the town's plans are ready and the delays sit with the Arizona Department of Transportation and the railroad, and that she would publish a contact number for residents to report backups on Marana Road and Tangerine.

Also discussed:

Ziegler opened the meeting with a moment of silence for the Marana High School student found dead on campus Sept. 8.
Cavanaugh announced a community meeting on neighborhood traffic safety, following the Aug. 20 death of an 11-year-old sixth-grader struck while riding his bike at Midfield Road and Hancock Drive in Gladden Farms, for Tuesday, Sept. 22, 6 to 7:30 p.m. at Tangerine Farms K-8.
At call to the public, Samantha Yeager, a Marana Unified teacher, described a March 2022 near-miss with her children at a crosswalk on Coachline Boulevard in Continental Ranch, walking home from a park with her two children on bikes, said the town's traffic engineer had told her at the time that a lack of reported crashes meant no action, and asked for an illuminated crosswalk. Ziegler had town staff meet her in the lobby about the concern and the Sept. 22 meeting.
Council members Cavanaugh and Comerford said Marana Food Bank donations have slowed and asked for contributions; Council Member Teri Murphy said her annual November pancake-breakfast fundraiser for the food bank will run the first week and third weekend of November.
Proclamations for Diaper Need Awareness Week (Sept. 14-20) and Constitution Week (Sept. 17-23).

This report was drafted by Claude Sonnet 4.6 from a live transcript produced by Deepgram Nova-2, then reviewed and edited by Nicholas De Leon with Claude Fable 5.1, and published at 8:23 AM MST on September 17, 2026. Read more about how this is made.