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How One Corporation Is Cashing In on America’s Drought
In an unprecedented deal, a private company purchased land in a tiny Arizona town—and sold its water rights to a suburb 200 miles away. Local residents fear the agreement has “opened Pandora’s box.”
As US states negotiate how they will divide up the river’s dwindling supplies, officials challenging the Greenstone transfer in court fear it will open the floodgates to many more private water sales, allowing investors to profit from scarcity. Greenstone’s managing director and vice-president, Mike Malano—a former realtor based in Phoenix who remains “active in the Arizona development community,” per his company bio—got himself elected to the board of the Cibola valley irrigation and drainage district, a quasi-governmental organization that oversees the distribution of water for agriculture in the region. Down a dusty, two-lane road, just past the unassuming cream-colored building where the Cibola Valley irrigation district is headquartered, a group gathered for an informal meeting with Holly Irwin last summer to discuss their grievances.
Or read this on Wired
