Bureau of Reclamation USBR

The Reclamation Act of June 17, 1902, signed by President Theodore Roosevelt, created a fund from western land sales to build irrigation projects that would make the arid West farmable. The Reclamation Service began inside the Geological Survey, became independent in 1907, and was renamed the Bureau of Reclamation in 1923. It works in the seventeen western states and is led by a Commissioner confirmed by the Senate.

In the 1930s it built Hoover Dam on the Colorado River and Grand Coulee Dam on the Columbia, public works that created Lake Mead and Lake Roosevelt, generated power for growing cities, and became symbols of the New Deal. Today it operates hundreds of dams and reservoirs, delivers water to about 31 million people and to farms covering roughly ten million acres, and is the second-largest producer of hydroelectric power in the nation.

Its central challenge is the Colorado River, which supplies seven states, Mexico, and dozens of tribes and has shrunk through a long drought. The 2007 guidelines for sharing shortages expire after 2026, and the upper and lower basin states have struggled to agree on replacements, leaving Interior to set terms if they cannot. On August 21, 2026, Interior issued operating guidelines for 2027 and 2028 within a ten-year framework, cutting deliveries to the lower basin states by 1.25 million acre-feet a year and tying Lake Powell releases to actual river conditions, without a full seven-state agreement. Supporters of a strong federal role say only Washington can force a deal, while many state officials argue that any lasting solution must come from the states themselves.