The water election that wasn’t – Grist

Hello, and welcome back to state of emergency. I’m Jake Bittle, and today we’re going to shift the focus away from the storm-ravaged Southeast and check out one of the nation’s hottest battleground states.

Election Day is just two weeks away, and the high-octane race for president is consuming nearly all of the media’s attention — we’ll have a big package on Grist tomorrow about the stakes of the election for all facets of the climate battle. Perhaps nowhere is the election intensity higher than in Arizona, a border state that has experienced sky-high inflation rates and a bruising debate over a restrictive abortion ban. Not only is the state a hub for the Electoral College, it’s also the site of toss-up races for the Senate and the House of Representatives. There is also a crucial contest for the state legislature, where Republicans hold one-seat majorities in both chambers.

I visited the Grand Canyon State in early October during an unseasonably warm week, when temperatures still climbed into the triple digits every afternoon. I have found that the frenzy of national politics has drawn attention away from the issue that is perhaps most important to Arizona’s future: water. Thanks to a millennium-scale drought fueled by climate change, the state has lost a large part of the water it comes from the all-important Colorado River, and groundwater aquifers fall in rural farm areas as well as in big cities like Phoenix.

This fall’s election will determine how the state tackles this crisis. If Democrats take control of the legislature, they will impose strict rules water use by farms and developerswhich they hope will ease the state’s water shortage even as it raises costs for the agricultural and real estate industries. Republicans will opt for easier rules, or no new rules at all, which many experts fear could lead to more wells drying up in suburbs and rural areas near big farms.

The outcome of the race hinges on just a few swing districts, most of them suburban areas surrounding larger cities like Phoenix and Tucson, but you might not know from visiting these places that water is on the ballot in November not. That’s because the state’s water policy is a complex jumble of acronyms and agencies, and partly because water is an invisible issue until the moment your faucet stops working. Wells have already dried up ruby red rural areas around the statebut for the suburban voters who will decide control of the legislature, this kind of water crisis is still decades away. They’ll go to the polls to make their voices heard on abortion, education and the economy — but the ballots they cast could have big implications for the dwindling aquifers beneath their feet.

You can read my full report of Arizona’s scorching swing districts here.

The big challenges facing the smallest state capital in the country

In response to a question about her plan to address climate change on the debate stage this summer, Vice President and presidential hopeful Kamala Harris did not talk about renewable energy, greenhouse gas emissions or clean energy jobs — talking points President Joe Biden has often had have. leaned on. She talked about housing. climate change, she saidhappens: “You ask anyone who’s been a victim of what that means in terms of losing their home, nowhere to go.”

America’s housing crisis is one of the only issues Republicans and Democrats in Congress agree needs to be fixed, and fast. The problem dates back to 2008, when the Great Recession caused real estate developers to dramatically cut back on the number of homes they built. The rate of new homes for sale since then sloggedwhich contributes to a shortage of 3.8 million residential units across the country from 2020.

Now extreme weather conditions are pinching already limited housing options: 2.5 million Americans were displacedeither temporarily or permanently, due to extreme weather last year. It is likely that even more were displaced by this year’s hurricanes. So what can states do about this problem? Last month I traveled to Vermont’s tiny state capital to talk to people there about the most common, and costliest, climate-driven threat in the US: flooding.

last year, more than 12 inches of rain fell on Montpelier in the span of a few days, breaking a rainfall record set in 1989. “We thought we were in this climate change haven,” one resident who moved from California to Vermont told me, “then you realize it doesn’t really exist.”

In Montpelier, city leaders, nonprofits, business associations and tourism boards are trying to tackle the city’s twin housing and climate crises. Together with the city council, the coalition is racing against the clock to make Montpelier more resilient before its next collision with climate change. “Our federal, our state and our local government all need to be better equipped to help people through these challenging climate disasters that we know are only going to continue to grow,” a Montpelier City Council member told me. “We have to do better.” You can read my full story here.

— Zoya Teirstein

What we read

An update on voting in North Carolina: The Guardian examines how candidates in western North Carolina – from those running for the smallest local positions to the presidential nominees – are struggling to reach voters in the wake of Hurricane Helene and a disaster that will not be resolved for months or even years will not be resolved.
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Who helps tribes after disasters? Our colleague Taylar Dawn Stagner, on Grist’s Indigenous Affairs desk, has the story on why indigenous peoples in the US are often left out of federal disaster relief and how tribes are stepping into the void to help other tribes recover from Hurricane Helene.
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Chris Christie on the politicization of hurricanes: New York Times opinion columnist Frank Bruni spoke with former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie about Hurricanes Helene and Milton, lessons learned from Superstorm Sandy recovery, and why he embraced former President Barack Obama in 2012, scandalizing the GOP at the time made (and still does today, says Christie).
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What is FEMA funding used for? The Arizona Republic fact checked viral claims that Federal Emergency Management Administration funds are being used to house illegal immigrants. FEMA does have a shelter and services program that helps states house and organize an influx of immigrants, in cooperation with the US Customs and Border Patrol. But the money for that program and FEMA funding for hurricane relief and recovery comes from two completely separate pots.
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What happened to the progressive left? Four years ago, Democratic candidates for president unveiled billion-dollar climate plans, among other progressive policies. Now, VP Kamala Harris — who used a $10 billion climate plan during her 2019 run for the White House — has no climate platform to speak of. She appears to be more focused on convincing swing voters that she will not ban fracking. Vox’s senior political correspondent Andrew Prokop took a broad look at why Democrats have moved to the right over the past four years.
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