Griffin Slams Hobbs' Veto of Douglas Active Management Area Bill

State Representative Gail Griffin (R-19) slammed Governor Katie Hobbs' (D-AZ) veto of House Bill 2089, which would have allowed the redesignation of an Active Management Area (AMA) after ten years. She said, "If the Governor believes in local control, she needs to let the people decide."

For additional context, the Douglas Groundwater Basin was designated as an Active Management Area in December 2022 following an election in November. This meant that only the land legally irrigated within the past five years could continue to be irrigated within the basin.

However, as the Arizona Daily Independent noted, Douglas residents are reconsidering the vote because the AMA designation is not working as intended. Despite this apparent remorse, the AMA designation cannot be overturned under current law.

Rep. Griffin's HB 2089 would thus allow Douglas residents to reconsider the vote after ten years, but Gov. Hobbs vetoed it, calling the bill "pointless" and "trivial."

"If the Governor believes in local control, she needs to let the people decide," the Sierra Vista Representative said in a statement, adding, "True local control requires giving people the right to vote, including the opportunity to reconsider their decision in the future."

Griffin further chastised Hobbs as someone who "clearly does not understand local control or represent rural Arizona. " Thus, the Representative said that the Governor "wants a framework that imposes more restrictions on rural Arizona than exist in urban areas like Phoenix and Tucson."

House Bill 2089 marks Hobbs's seventh veto to earn the ire of Arizona Republicans. In late April, Hobbs vetoed House Bill 2271, another bill pushed by Griffin. This bill would require the Arizona Department of Water Resources (ADWR) to provide data such as active index wells, depth-to-water averages, and total groundwater volume in its annual supply and demand reports for rural groundwater basins.

Five previous bills included easing regulations on building small modular nuclear reactors, parental rights, vaccine requirements, election reform, and single-sex spaces.