Sponsors (2)
The bill delivers major, long‑sought water infrastructure funding, legal certainty, and environmental protections for the Yavapai‑Apache Nation and nearby communities at the cost of substantial federal spending and by requiring the Nation to waive broad claims and accept restrictions that limit future flexibility and remedies.
Yavapai‑Apache Nation members and nearby rural communities receive dedicated, multi‑year federal funding (over $1 billion in transfers plus trust/fund investments) to build, operate, and maintain drinking‑water, wastewater, and pipeline infrastructure, improving water reliability, sanitation, and public health.
YAN members, the Nation, and other project beneficiaries gain legal certainty and settlement finality for many water rights and damage claims, reducing litigation risk and enabling implementation of the Settlement Agreement.
The Act secures environmental protections for the Verde River (instream flow protections, flood flows, and continued stream gaging) and requires compliance with ESA/NEPA during implementation, helping preserve ecosystems and cultural resources.
All U.S. taxpayers face substantial federal costs (roughly $1+ billion in mandated transfers plus additional federal construction/OM&R obligations and seed funding), increasing federal spending and fiscal exposure.
Many Yavapai‑Apache Nation members give up broad historic and future water‑related claims and waive certain remedies, which reduces tribal leverage, could foreclose compensation for past harms, and limits avenues to assert or expand water rights later.
The Act restricts future flexibility for water use and markets—limiting CAP water transfers/uses (e.g., to within Arizona and selected counties), narrowly defining Act‑specific water terms, and protecting some rights in trust—which may constrain regional water trading and management options.
Based on analysis of 32 sections of legislative text.
Establishes Treasury-funded project and trust accounts, builds a pipeline and drinking-water system, takes listed lands into trust, and ratifies a Yavapai‑Apache Nation water-rights settlement with conditions.
Introduced December 26, 2025 by Eli Crane · Last progress December 26, 2025
Provides funding, land-into-trust, and legal settlement to implement a comprehensive water-rights settlement for the Yavapai‑Apache Nation. It requires Treasury transfers into a project fund and a trust fund to build the Cragin‑Verde Pipeline and a Nation drinking-water system, takes specific parcels into trust, ratifies and settles the Nation’s water rights, and sets contract, operation, and enforcement rules for delivery and use of the Nation’s Central Arizona Project (CAP) water. The law conditions its full effect on the Secretary of the Interior publishing a findings notice (the “Enforceability Date”) that various actions and approvals have occurred; it creates multi-account funds, prescribes who pays operation and maintenance costs, limits certain future legal claims, preserves some adjudication rights, and requires federal agencies to carry out planning, design, construction, monitoring, and long-term management tasks.