APRIL 2013 - Conserve to Enhance Program Grants $31,000 to Four Neighborhoods

Tucson's Conserve to Enhance Program (C2E) links water conservation efforts with watershed restoration and enhancement. Tucson Water has partnered with local non-profit organizations to protect and enhance our open space and riparian areas. You can contribute by making a donation through the Open Space and Riparian Contribution checkbox on your utility bill. Visit Conserve to Enhance Program Resources & News for more information.

Protecting Riparian Areas through Conserve to Enhance

By directly funding projects that restore and protect local riparian areas and urban washes, C2E ensures that water conservation translates into benefits for the environment. Riparian areas are vegetation, habitat, and ecosystems associated with rivers, streams, washes, or springs.

There are two ways to participate in the C2E Program: 1) New participants are welcome and encouraged to help enhance our urban rivers and washes. Program participants conserve water at their home or business, C2E tracks their water savings, and participants donate the value of their savings back to the program fund; 2) Donate to C2E by simply contributing to the Open Space/Riparian checkbox on your Tucson Water bill (utility services statement).

Please join us! The 60 C2E Pilot Program participants have saved more than 1.9 million gallons of water and donated more than $1,700 for riparian restoration restoration since January 2011.

Preserving Open Space

Guided by the vision of the Sonoran Desert Conservation Plan, and with funding largely from voter-approved open space bonds, Pima County has conserved more than 201,000 acres of open space in the last 15 years. This has created a vast network of open space around Tucson’s urban core with important parcels also being preserved, when possible, within Tucson city limits.
 

The Coalition for Sonoran Desert Protection, Pima County, the City of Tucson, and Tucson Water are partners for the preservation of open space in the Tucson region.
 

C2E is managed by the Sonoran Institute, the University of Arizona Water Resources Research Center (WRRC), and the Watershed Management Group. For more information, also visit the WRRC's C2E page.