Aquifer's water level rises near Cannon Air Force Base

An effort to conserve area groundwater may be getting results with a level uptick recorded northwest of Cannon Air Force Base.

The news came during a regular session of the Curry County Commission on Tuesday.

Ogallala Land and Water Conservancy Executive Director Ladona Clayton gave a presentation of the work the group has been engaged in recently.

The group has encouraged a number of landowners to not use their wells on their property. While the group continues to talk to other landowners who are not participating in the plan, 53 wells have been turned off in an area in the vicinity of Cannon Air Force Base.

Clayton noted that for years the aquifer level is going down but recently, measurements of the aquifer have “shown an uptick.”

Clayton said, “Lack of water threatens mission resiliency” and stressed the strong interrelationship between Cannon and the aquifer.

Replenishing the aquifer is the major goal of the group, according to Clayton.

“Our relationship with the Ute Water Pipeline Project is with our conserved water, and we would be a supplemental supply to the pipeline water,” Clayton said after her presentation.

In other business:

n Commissioners heard a presentation from Clovis Economic Development Executive Director Tina Dziuk.

After her presentation regarding projects the group is engaged in, Commissioner Fidel Madrid asked if there were new retail businesses coming in.

Dziuk spoke of the North Plains Mall having a new owner and a retail store called Big R and it will be arriving in the fall at the mall.

“It’s like Tractor Supply with more clothes,” Dziuk said of the retailer.

While speaking of possible retail stores for the area, Dziuk told commissioners she would be attending a retailer’s convention in the near future.

n Commissioners heard from Curry County Financial Advisor Rob Burpo, who updated the group on the effects the recent bank failures had on the national economy and the county’s investments.

Burpo estimates income from the county’s investments by the end of the year to be about $800,000.

“In the first three months of this year you have earned 53% of what you earned in all of last year,” Burpo told commissioners.