State Investments for a Resilient Arizona

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This blog was updated on July 3, 2025, to reflect what is included in the Arizona state budget for fiscal year 2026 as well as other outcomes from the 2025 state legislative session. View the updated Audubon Southwest bill tracker here.

Each year, Audubon outlines its priorities for Arizona’s state budget. We, along with our network, advocate for investments, including conservation funding, that will help improve the resilience of Arizona’s lands and waters. Resilience is the ability to prepare for and adapt to climate shifts and extremes, including rising temperatures, increased drying, and variability in precipitation. 

Additionally, Audubon supports the continued investment in the state agencies charged with managing, conserving, and protecting water supplies—like rivers and groundwater. 

To pass a state budget, the Republican-controlled Arizona Legislature and Democratic Governor Katie Hobbs had to come to an agreement.  

In the funding priorities discussed below, we mention the General Fund. The General Fund refers to the portion of state revenues that are not already dedicated for a specific purpose, and its monies primarily come from taxes collected in three categories: sales, corporate income, and individual income. There are also additional funding sources that contribute to the General Fund, and they vary from year-to-year.  

Audubon supports the following state funding investments to protect Arizona’s lands and waters for fiscal year 2026 (which began on July 1, 2025):  

• Audubon request: $26.4 million from the General Fund for the Arizona Department of Water Resources (ADWR). Total funded in state budget: 28.4 million (from multiple funding sources, including the General Fund and the Water Infrastructure Finance Authority's Long Term Water Augmentation Fund). ADWR is charged with protecting and managing Arizona’s water supplies. This funding will enable ADWR to carry out its mission, add six new positions to enhance their team and capacity, assess the available water supplies and demands in every groundwater basin in the state, negotiate among the Colorado River Basin states (as well as within the state) on how Arizona will reduce its Colorado River use after the year 2026, administer groundwater management programs (including the newer Willcox and Douglas Active Management Areas), and be the technical experts in ongoing legal work to determine who has the rights to access water from river and streams across the state, among other duties. 

• Audubon request: $11 million from the General Fund for the Arizona Department of Environmental Quality. Total funded in state budget: $126.44 million (from multiple funding sources, including $26 million from the Water Infrastructure Finance Authority's Long Term Water Augmentation Fund; no funding provided from General Fund). This will ensure adequate funding for staffing to carry out the Department’s required duties for air quality, water quality, and other environmental programs the Department implements.  

• Audubon request: $9 million additional for the Water Quality Fee Fund (administered by the Arizona Department of Environmental Quality). Total funded in state budget: $9 million (from the Water Infrastructure Finance Authority's Long Term Water Augmentation Fund). This one-time deposit to the Water Quality Fee Fund supports surface water, groundwater, and drinking water programs that protect and improve the water quality integrity of the Arizona’s water supplies. This fund has historically had insufficient revenue to cover annual costs, and this deposit would address the annual shortfall. 

• Audubon request: $10 million from the General Fund for the On-Farm Irrigation Efficiency Fund. Total funded in state budget: $2 million. Administered by the University of Arizona, this program provides grants and collects data for on-farm irrigation efficiency systems to reduce the use of groundwater, surface water, and Colorado River water. 

• Audubon request: $2.5 million from the General Fund for the Arizona State Parks Heritage Fund. Total funded in state budget: $1 million. The Heritage Fund provides grants to local entities for park development, historic preservation, nonmotorized trails, and outdoor education. This funding is crucial for protecting important environmental and historical sites and landscapes across the state and serves as a match to garner additional public and private funding.  

  • There is also a bill, House Concurrent Resolution 2011, which did not advance this year, that would allow Arizona voters to decide if $10 million from the state lottery fund should be deposited into the Arizona State Parks Heritage Fund annually, effectively reinstating the monies swept by the legislature during the Great Recession. 

• Audubon request: $1 million from the General Fund for nonnative vegetation species eradication. Total funded in state budget: No new monies allocated. This effort, administered by the Arizona Department of Forestry and Fire Management, promotes the removal of nonnative vegetation species, such as salt cedar (also known as tamarisk), and installation of native vegetation, which can help reduce wildfire and flooding risks, while providing habitat for wildlife.  

• Audubon request: $250,000 from the General Fund for the Arizona Trail. Total funded in the state budget: No new monies allocated. The Arizona Trail spans 800 miles from the Utah border south to the border with Mexico, crossing important habitats for birds like Coopers Hawks and American Goshawks. The Trail is open to non-motorized uses such as hiking, biking, backpacking, and horseback riding. Additional state investments for trail maintenance, planning, and preservation are needed to protect this route for years to come. 

• Total funded in state budget: $250,000 for the Water Infrastructure Finance Authority’s Water Conservation Grant Fund. This grant fund has successfully distributed $214.1 million to water resilience projects throughout the state and could deploy additional projects with additional funding.  The Water Conservation Grant Fund kicked off in 2023 with $200 million, and was recently awarded a supplementary $14.1 million from Governor Hobbs thanks to available American Rescue Plan Act monies. In total, projects are expected to save up to 6 million acre feet of water over their lifetimes. There is need and buy-in from Arizona water users that they can and want to use less water. 

Protecting Arizona’s lands and waters requires continued investment from the state. The fiscal year 2026 state budget incorporates much of the funding Audubon and our advocates requested lawmakers to include. Additional funding investments to water and natural resources can be found here as well. 

Other 2025 legislative session outcomes:

While negotiations did continue throughout the legislative session, unfortunately, lawmakers and rural stakeholders could not reach agreement on a bipartisan compromise for a new rural groundwater management tool. Audubon Southwest will continue to monitor these discussions and push for groundwater management in more parts of Arizona. Progress has been made, albeit with existing groundwater management tools: in January 2025, the Arizona Department of Water Resources designated the Willcox Groundwater Basin as Active Management Area. The Department proposed an aggressive management goal: to reduce groundwater overdraft (more water being pumped than replenished) in the basin by 50 percent by 2075.

A bright spot for bipartisan agreement on water legislative this session relates to urban groundwater management. The passage of Senate Bill 1611 will facilitate responsible and water-wise housing, while saving groundwater. 

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