The Association and District
The Association
The Association is the older of SRP's two organizations. It began when a group of
early Valley residents searched for an effective means to bring water to their families,
farms and communities.
These pioneers tried to irrigate crops with a simple canal system fed by the Salt River.
Canal operations were unpredictable. Sometimes the river shrank to a trickle, while
other times, the river swelled beyond its banks and washed away a season of hard work.
In 1902, President Theodore Roosevelt signed the National Reclamation Act. The law
provided federal loans for construction of reclamation projects in the West. Valley
settlers formed the Association in 1903 and pledged their land as collateral for federal
government loan to build a massive water storage and delivery system.
The cornerstone of the system, Theodore Roosevelt Dam, was dedicated in 1911, six
years after construction began. The dam was rededicated in 1996 following Safety of
Dam modifications that added 77 feet of height to the dam and needed conservation
and flood control capacity.
As part of its operations, the Association cooperatively manages a 13,000-square-mile
"watershed" or natural drainage area in the mountains north and east of metropolitan
Phoenix. This watershed feeds the Salt and Verde rivers that flow into the SRP reservoir
system. From 1923 to 1946, five more water-storage dams were built along the Salt and
Verde rivers to help satisfy the Valley's need for a reliable supply of water.
The duties of the Association increased as more people moved to metropolitan Phoenix.
Water-quality monitoring and water conservation became priorities as agricultural needs
decreased and urban uses increased.
Today, the Association delivers nearly 1 million acre-feet of water to a 240,000-acre
service area in metropolitan Phoenix. The reservoir system feeds an extensive water
delivery network comprising 1,265 miles of canals, laterals and smaller channels.
This delivery network carries water to municipalities as well as agricultural and urban
irrigators.
During the Great Depression, Valley farmers were hard-pressed to make payments
on the federal loans for Theodore Roosevelt Dam and other dams on the Salt River.
To help reduce payments on the outstanding loans, the Arizona Legislature enacted
a law that allowed the formation of the Salt River Project Agricultural Improvement
and Power District in 1937.
As a political subdivision of the state, the District can issue tax-free municipal bonds,
thereby reducing interest costs and saving SRP electric and water users millions of dollars.
As the Valley's population has grown, the District has tapped many power sources to
provide electricity to more than 700,000 customers. Besides the time-honored hydroelectric
generating units at the dams on the Salt River, the District owns or participates in 10
generating stations in the Southwest. Customers also are served by power drawn from
various other generating facilities in the Valley and state, as well as from contractual power
purchases.
