Useful
Resources

Convened by Desert Botanical Garden, the Central Arizona Conservation Alliance (CAZCA) aligns and unifies the efforts of more than sixty partner and collaborating organizations to conserve, restore, and raise awareness for open space in Central Arizona. Through community engagement, collaboration, and strategic regional coordination, CAZCA works to ensure a sustainable regional open space system that supports healthy ecosystems and healthy communities.

Through the collaborative development of the Regional Open Space Strategy for Maricopa County, CAZCA is working to address critical open space challenges across Maricopa County.

In January 2016, with significant human and financial resources from the Nina Mason Pulliam Charitable Trust and partner organizations, the Central Arizona Conservation Alliance convened a multi-scale, stakeholder-driven, strategic planning process in an effort to reconcile our region’s values for economic growth and conservation of our natural and cultural heritage. Through hundreds of collaborative workshops and meetings, and with copious research and outreach, that process has resulted in this Regional Open Space Strategy for Maricopa County (ROSS). The goals, objectives, and actions comprising the ROSS set the course for sustaining the region’s most valuable assets - the natural environment and open space. When fully implemented these collective actions will result in a durable prosperity and resiliency for this and future generations. Join us as we come together as a region to realize the goals set forth in the ROSS and begin to secure Maricopa County’s vibrant future.

Arizona’s State Department of Water Resources has compiled a clear and concise data source on water resources for our State. Check out the “Water Your Facts” section of the site for easy-to-understand facts about this precious resource.

Three rivers in the West Valley, Avondale/Goodyear/Buckeye, have worked together with Maricopa County Flood Control District on design standards and planning guidelines for a 17-mile stretch of the Salt/Gila river corridor. The plan is still in early stages and focuses on ecological and habitat restoration within the West Valley flood plain.

The Urban Waters Federal Partnership reconnects urban communities with their waterways by improving coordination among federal agencies and collaborating with community-led revitalization efforts to improve our nation's water systems and promote their economic, environmental and social benefits. Specifically, this partnership:

• Breaks down federal program silos to promote more efficient and effective use of federal resources through better coordination and targeting of federal investments.
• Recognizes and builds on local efforts and leadership, by engaging and serving community partners.
• Works with local officials and effective community-based organizations to leverage area resources and stimulate local economies to create local jobs.
• Learns from early and visible victories to fuel long-term action.

This website captures the history of the Rio Salado Project from its conception in the Arizona State University College of Architecture in 1966 to the dedication of the completed Tempe Town Lake in 1999. It provides a historical overview and timeline, documents, and past leadership who conceived, designed and constructed the Tempe Town Lake and its associated amenities.

• Water and Birds in the Arid West: Habits in Decline

  Audubon has released a fascinating and educational new report on creating a sustainable water future for birds and people in the American West.

• Lower Salt and Gila Riparian Ecosystem

  From the Arctic Slope in Alaska to the Mississippi Delta, and from the Northeast’s Long Island Sound to the wetlands of the Everglades, the power of Important Bird Areas (IBAs) cannot be overstated. Audubon is leading the way to protect these iconic places and the birds that depend on them, and mobilizing their network of Chapters to act as stewards. Check out this interesting webpage on the ‘Important Bird Area’ (IBA) of the Lower Salt and Gila River Ecosystem.

• Western Rivers Action Network

  Audubon Arizona has created an informative fact sheet on the economic valuation of river ecosystems to the State of Arizona. Check out ‘River Economics’ and then join their network!

The Salt River Project, a community-based water and energy company, has a website full of useful facts on the Valley’s water supply and issues of drought. SRP has provided water and power to the Valley for more than a century and is a wealth of information, both historic and current.

Partners engage in collaborative efforts to heal the Gila River. Public invited to learn the area's history and the restoration efforts being undertaken at http://bit.ly/LGRCStoryMap

Arizona’s outdoor recreation economy is significant and will be impacted by future recreation along the Rio. Click through to educate yourself on the Association, and this two page fact sheet on the critical value of outdoor industries to our state. https://outdoorindustry.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/OIA_RecEcoState_AZ.pdf