Colorado State University complicit in diversion of municipal water -name of research, teaching

DENVER - Aug. 19, 2015 - PRLog -- Todos Santos, BCS, Mexico - 2 years after CSU partners with Denver based development company, Black Creek Capital/MIRA for a luxury spa and research center in this small Mexican village, water, elementary education and public health are put to the test as they claim to be “legally” diverting 10,000’s of gallons of water away from villagers and their children.  “We were proud that an American school would come to research in our beautiful town.  But now my granddaughter does not have water for her first day of school.  She cannot bathe or drink, her mother cannot cook or wash her clothes without walking into town with buckets” says a Todos Santos resident whose family goes back 4 generations.

The Colorado State University that built up its award winning sustainability reputation scrambles as media attention is grabbed across the world, faculty members have resigned from an executive committee for being ignored and sustainability awards like the one from Sierra Club are questioned.

Documents obtained under the Colorado Open Records Act (CORA) reveal that in January 2015 CSU learned from their privately hired Professional Engineer the following information, yet failed to act either by sharing the information with the community CSU would be impacting or by formally protesting to MIRA/Tres Santos:

The MIRA/Tres Santos project engineer told CSU’s engineer that MIRA purchased additional water from the municipal supply and that MIRA is taking steps to construct their own pump station to draw water from the municipal supply. CSU’s engineer asked the Tres Santos project engineer a lot of hard questions. CSU’s engineer concluded that the Tres Santos engineer could not answer them and then stated,  “I do not think he [the Tres Santos engineer] understands distribution system hydraulics.” The CSU engineer went on to say, “I am worried that when Town Farm [which includes the CSU Campus] draws water through pumping, it exhausts the supply for other parts of town.”

CSU’s engineer went on to make these observations:

“There are many hydraulic complications to this and I do not believe MIRA is addressing them.” “A new pumping station inside the distribution system could be detrimental to the existing pipeline infrastructure.” I have been told that “the existing pipes are in very poor condition and leak a ton.” “A separate pump station is not necessarily a good thing.”

CSU’s engineer went on to advise CSU that:

“I have not met anyone who is approaching the challenges in a smart, effective manner. As with most developers, they are installing what they need to make their project viable...which may be at the detriment to what exists.”

“Prior to exploring the options for CSU center at Todos Santos we discussed the water impact concerns with MIRA [Black Creek] and are confident they are fully prepared to address the needs of the development” said Provost and Executive Vice President, CSU Rick Miranda, in a letter dated in the summer of 2014.  But when recently told about the lack of water for neighboring residents CSU spokesperson Kim Kita replied: “…It’s only temporary”.

For more information regarding Colorado State University’s “gift with strings” from Black Creek amounting to over 4 million dollars and the human and environmental affronts against the small Mexican village, see www.TruthSantos.org. Short clip (https://vimeo.com/136352578), and Facebook/ (https://www.facebook.com/pages/TRUTH-Santos/1400156180304798)



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