Forest Service claims no authority over public land degradation caused by private wells

Pinto Creek's flow in Arizona's Tonto National Forest has dropped more than 90% in a decade, largely from groundwater pumping feeding the Pinto Valley Mine, which uses over 5 trillion gallons of water yearly. The Forest Service approved the mine's 2021 expansion while claiming it lacks authority over the private wells supplying it, even though its own environmental review called the wells consolidated under the mine's operations.

The Sierra Club sued in 2024 arguing the agency violated federal environmental and endangered species law by ignoring harm to two protected bird species. In court, a Justice Department attorney conceded open-pit mining will ‘obliterate’ forest land but argued that stopping it would mean overriding a private operator's state-granted water rights.

The Forest Service itself asked Arizona's water agency in 2019 to declare the mine's water use a violation of its own protected instream water right, established in 1999 for exactly this scenario. The state declined, and the judge, a Trump appointee, has tentatively sided with the agency on the private-well question but with the Sierra Club on how it analyzed downstream harm.

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