A Utah Dictator is Born
How would you feel if I told you that you are being forced to give up your water rights, while also paying more for it, while our state representatives are draining our water intentionally and getting some major dollars back for doing it? Did you know Utah representatives are stealing our water from us to give to other countries? Do you know where all our water is actually going when it is sent to the Great Salt Lake and into the West Desert? Do you know what it is being used for? How would you feel about our governor being given dictator controls to forcibly shut our water off on us whenever he decides it’s OK? How about the fact that he is encouraging neighbors to turn on each other by reporting each other? Turn each other in? Since when did Utah decide to start behaving like Nazi Germany? Would you be upset to find out that not one water department head in Utah seems to know if we have all received our share of water rights? Utah legislation has required that our water utility companies raise the price of water on us to “encourage” water conservation while sending our water to the West Desert for the financial benefit of other states and countries. How does that make you feel? How do you feel about the fact that our state officials see the dollar signs from those investments but the tax payers don’t see any of it? How about all of those fun new water bills that our Legislature just proposed to be voted on this general session 2023… the ones that would allow eminent domain during contrived water shortages and agriculture regulations on our own land? These bills would have made Stalin proud.
We are about to take a journey through our state government’s plans for our water and food. I have to warn you; they aren’t pleasant.
The Unsolved Mystery of our Water Records
First, let’s talk about the fact that none of the departments that are being paid to maintain and operate our water allocations seem to have a clue about where all of our water is going. For those of you who read my last segment on the water, you know that on September 9th, Deer Creek Reservoir was releasing massive amounts of water from the dam. When Deer Creek personnel were questioned about this, their response was that they were draining our precious resource into the Great Salt Lake to raise the levels of the lake. Knowing they did not have legislative permission to do so, I immediately contacted the state Legislature. I was given different reasons for the water being drained from the dam. One legislator said that this is protocol for winter and the reason was also given that the water that was drained was being sent underground for storage. Another legislator told me that both the water manager of Deer Creek Reservoir and the state director (Department of Water Resources) told this same legislator that, because it had been so hot, water was being released to M&I (municipal and irrigation). I found it interesting that I was being given different reasons for the release of that water so I decided to send in a GRAMA request for the records of where the water went that week and how much water was released. So far, the Utah Department of Water Resources, including the Division of Utah Water Rights, and the State Park Department (considering Deer Creek is a state park) have all replied with the same answer: they do not have any records regarding water allocations for water rights at Deer Creek Reservoir. I find this interesting considering that our Division of Water Rights is supposed to be responsible for making sure the state receives their allotted water rights that they have paid for. If they aren’t maintaining this, what are we paying them to do with our tax dollars and who is maintaining it? Furthermore, I was directed to check with the Provo River Water Users Association or the Bureau of Reclamation for those records. The Provo River Water Users Association responded by providing a letter that they sent out to their shareholders stating that they would all receive only 90% of their allotted shares in water this year. When they were asked for records on which districts/regions received water allocations on September 9th and 10th, and how much water was released, they responded by saying that they don’t have those records. Apparently, they are in charge of keeping records on file of who is supposed to receive water allocations from Deer Creek dam but they don’t have the records on if those people actually received those water rights… I find this very strange. Furthermore, the Attorney General and the Law Enforcement divisions of this department reached out to find out what it was that I was looking for…which I found a bit excessive. I also found, to be a bit excessive, the cost of at least $141, per hour, of gathering any of these available records to give to the public. Either someone does not want to provide these records to the public or there is a high possibility that the Bureau of Reclamation (who I was also directed to), meaning the federal government, is the one keeping records on our water right allocations. Now, federal funding was given to construct the dam at Deer Creek, but considering Deer Creek provides 50% of the state with M&I water supply, this is a pretty big concern; maintenance and operations are performed at the dam here in Utah so, even if the federal government does have records on Deer Creek water allocations, at least one water department in Utah would need to also have a copy of those records. I find it unbelievable that not one person in Utah, that is supposed to be in charge of water rights here, knows where our water is going. What are we paying them to do?? It seems extremely irresponsible and reckless of our state legislators to continue to spend our money on appropriations to departments for things they apparently aren’t doing.
I also found out that a lot of our water rights from Colorado River, specifically our drinking water and waste-water, are protected records under the GRAMA, meaning that our government decided that the public shouldn’t be allowed to access those records. I have a hard time imagining any scenario that would justify the people not having permission to access records about their own water on their own land that they pay for… It almost seems as if the reason for this is that they don’t want us finding out where our water is actually going. As we get closer to the end of this blog post, you’ll start to understand why that might be.
A few days after water was released from the dam at Deer Creek Reservoir, several news articles were released with an alarming tone, that Deer Creek was down to 42% capacity. They peddled the narrative that the reservoir was low and never once mentioned that it had anything to do with the fact that the water level was lowered intentionally. With the fear being pushed about this “drought” we are in, the narrative seemed to be irresponsibly taken out of context by the media. About a week later, I watched a legislative interim session where water heads were presenting a drought update to our Legislature. They presented a map of several reservoirs that were at low capacity and they listed Deer Creek as one of those low reservoirs at 42%. I immediately had to wonder how many of the other reservoirs were lower because they had been intentionally drained. After I spoke to several legislators about this, the news articles that had reported the frightening low levels at Deer Creek suddenly disappeared.
Contradictions at Legislative Session
Something else that I found interesting was when I attended a public event where different water heads presented, to the public, to encourage state wide water-wise conservation efforts. You can read my first blog on the water to understand why these efforts are probably not a good idea. Toward the end of the meeting, they held a Q&A and a man in the back of the room stated he has been replacing the lining of irrigation canals that are leaking because our state government has not been taking care of that themselves. He stated that about 60% of water is leaking from these canals before water even reaches irrigation and he wanted to know why they aren’t being fixed. The head of one of the water departments told him that the reason they aren’t fixings these leaks is because they don’t have the funding to do it. About one week later, that very same department head was asked by Legislation, what they have been using legislative appropriation funds for, and he told them that one of the three things our tax dollars are being used for is fixing leakage of irrigation canals. He was either lying to us at the meeting or lying to Legislation. It seems there is a lot of contradictions and deceitful intent being made toward Utah tax payers about what it is exactly that they are spending our money on. You’d think leakage of our irrigation canals to our farmers would be higher on the priority list for our public officials than the water used for data cooling centers, building all these new homes, replacing all of our water infrastructure with smart piping that they can digitally control, and installing smart meters and now smart secondary water meters. Spencer Cox announced that, “we will take all the immigrants we can get.” Now, I am all for helping others (that come here legally), however, why aren’t we sending immigrants to our eastern states for the time being? Instead, Cox is welcoming as many as we can get to the west desert in a middle of a supposed drought where we don’t have the extra water to share. Why are our elected officials acting so irresponsibly and recklessly with our water supply?
A Water Bill Made Just for Joseph Stalin
In addition to our farmers’ water not being a priority for Cox’s appointed department heads, they are forcing water banks on our farmers and those out in rural areas who don’t want to give up their water. H.B. 168 was passed last session which knocks farming and rural irrigation down on the priority list of water preference rights during a “water shortage emergency,” and gives the priority of those water rights to commercial agriculture. Why are they supporting corporations over our own local farmers? In addition, our legislators have drafted a new bill that they will be voting on this general session of 2023. It has a lot of scary things in it. It would give our state agencies control and regulation powers over all of our livestock, farms, nurseries, greenhouses, gardens, apiaries, parks, orchards, cemeteries, and any other means of growing, producing, storing, and selling our own food on private property. The reason? They want to regulate animal and plant life “for our safety” to “prevent and cure” communicable, infections, and contagious diseases in insects and animals and poisonous and noxious diseases in plants. Australian farmers are already being forced to vaccinate their livestock. Is that where we are headed here? Why do our public officials want access to our apiaries for this as well? Really? Bees??? The first thing that comes to mind is cross pollination and all of that genetically modified food they seem to love so much. Apparently, weeds, insects, and plants are all planning a poison attack on us and they are somehow predicting the future into an outbreak of contagious diseases among our livestock. Furthermore, this bill would also create the “Board of Control” which would be given the authority to start forcing us to have our grain graded. You know… also to “keep us safe.” Not only that, we would also be required to pay for their grading “services” (if that’s what you want to call it) and our taxes would go up to fund this new grading division in order to pay state employees that would be responsible for forcing us to have our grain graded. You can’t help but to stop and think about the similarities between this and Stalin. What he best known for taking over during his Industrial Revolution reign of terror? He took over the grain and he made it nearly impossible for them to afford providing their own food for themselves.
Under this bill, our Department of Agriculture would also be allowed to inspect, investigate, subpoena witnesses and records, conduct hearings, and issue orders in order to enforce their regulations. Does this seem a bit authoritative and completely out of their jurisdiction to you? Yeah… me too. A requirement of this new board would be that they would have to work with the USDA which would bring the federal government’s regulations right into our own backyards and into our farmers’ backyards. This would give the feds access to implement their own regulations, where we provide food for ourselves, whenever they want. We would also be forced to give tax dollars to production and marketing of agriculture. The question is: will that funding be on behalf of our farmers or commercial agriculture? I have an idea of which one I think it will be, and it isn’t the first one. Additionally, this bill would give them the authority to take charge over any food distribution, which would include farmers and butchers selling directly, and would also apply to fruit stands. It would also give them permission to take or damage your property, including crops, as long as they “compensate” you for it when they think it’s necessary to compensate you. Perhaps the most disturbing part I find about this bill is the authority given to this new Board to order isolated quarantines. The language of the bill does not specify if this would be for animals or people but don’t worry, there is another bill they just proposed that would give the Utah Department of Health and Humans Services the authority to do just that to people. Not only that, they will be able to damage your property and forcibly remove you from it to quarantine you… All in the name of “public health” and “safety”. Doesn’t that sound fun? Even if this new board is only quarantining livestock, are we OK with them taking our farmers' livestock from them?
All of these new dictatorship-like authorities would be created under the newly proposed bill called the Emergency Water Shortages Amendments. This bill would also allow several of our government agencies to forcibly “interrupt water use.” Again, under eminent domain, they would be allowed to take or damage your property in order to do this, including crops. They always seem to convince people to accept these things by manipulating them into thinking it is in the best interest of the public. They will try to convince you that it’s perfectly fine for them to do this; that we don’t have enough water to go around for everyone and that we need to do our part to give up our water and property to share with everyone else… Don’t fall for it.
Our Brine Tell a New Story about the Theft of our Water by The Lithium King
If you read my first blog, you will remember that we have a renewable source of clean water in the Earth’s crust that we can tap into with wells. Scientists have stated water is made in the crust and that we have "oceans of water within the crust." All of that water is clean and renewable. First of all, if you remember my first blog, I go over how they are creating a drought narrative including the things they are blaming on climate change. Second, I also talk about the West Desert Pumps at the Great Salt Lake. If you remember, the manager of the pumps had done an interview where he had said that, in order to maintain them, he has to rotate the pumps and replace nitrogen cylinders in them once per month to keep water vapor from pressurizing inside them. Our government has told us that the pumps have not been turned on since 1989. Well, they’ve recently changed their tune. A new article came out where they admit they are diverting water and that, in order to maintain the pumps, they spend $10,000 of our tax payer dollars to have someone go out and turn the pumps on once per month. These pumps spit out 1.5 million gallons of water per minute. So, even if they turn the pumps on, at their lowest setting for 30 seconds once per month, that is a lot of water being pumped into the west desert. Even so, I recently came across a very disturbing discovery regarding where all that water, being pushed under the salt flats of our west desert, is going. Our governor and our state officials have known for some time where all of that water in the Great Salt Lake is going as well, but they never thought to mention it to us.
The narrative, for some time now, has been that Great Salt Lake is drying up “due to the drought.” Did you know that there are several magnesium and lithium mining companies who have water rights to the Great Salt Lake? As of June of this year 2022, one of these corporations, called The Lithium King which covers 1,700 acres of our salt flats, is now 100% owned by British Columbia, Canada who is partnered with and trades with China. Yes, you read that right. Another country, who does business with our enemy, owns 1,700 acres of our salt flats where they also lay claims to our water. US Magnum, based out of Canada, also mines lithium here. US Magnesium claims water rights to the Great Salt Lake for lithium and magnesium mining as well. There are more. Do you know how lithium is mined in salt lakes? A massive amount of water is evaporated and then the crust from the salt is crushed and the lithium is then extracted. Roughly 500,000 gallons of water goes into extracting one ton of lithium. To put that into perspective, it takes around one tablespoon of lithium to produce one cell phone, meaning, 500,000 gallons of water would make 190,000 cell phones. Mining takes up 65% of the province's water in Salar de Atacama, Chile and it has destroyed their environment and health. How much water will we allow them to use here for the same thing?
We have heard the narrative about the brine and the brine shrimp and protecting the brine and the water levels for the birds. Perhaps there is another reason our state officials are obsessed with the brine. You want to know what makes high-quality lithium? Brine. How about the narrative that the arsenic dust, out on the salt flats, will be swept up by the wind and into the air for us to breathe? Our state officials, including Dictator Cox, keep telling us that if the water in the lake dries up, we will be breathing that in and it will be very dangerous for us. First of all, if arsenic has been in the dust, from dried up salt flats, the entire time the Great Salt Lake has been drying up, we would have been breathing in that supposed arsenic dust in all along. This means we would have been breathing it in for years. So then, why is it just now a problem? You want to know what else is extremely toxic to breathe? A mineral that also creates dust when it is mined? Lithium. The Guardian talks about the health effects and dangers of children, as young as seven years old, being used to mine Lithium in other countries which is supported by many of the corporations who mine lithium in the states. There are several articles, like this one, that talk about how harmful lithium is to the environment and also to humans and animals. This article links sources to the Environmental Protection Agency publishing how to properly dispose of lithium batteries because of how dangerous they are and mentions the fact that they are labeled “high hazard.” Speaking about toxic mining dust, did you know there is a dust-collection method where our state officials could actually have that dust collected so it wouldn’t be a health threat to us? Have they told us that? No. The only solution we have been given is that we need to conserve the water we are using, report our neighbors for wasting water, and look away while they drain our fresh water supply into the Great Salt Lake... “to save us.”
Representative Tim Hawkes commented for an article, published by the Salt Lake Tribune, stating that they know that “there are fairly large amounts of lithium in the lake.” Hawkes also sponsored H.B. 157 which created the Great Salt Lake Account where our tax dollars will go to fund support projects to keep water in the Great Salt Lake for mining. This bill includes evaporation as part of the processes for the definition of mining. Reps Owens and Sandall sponsored H.B. 317 which made using, removing, or extracting minerals from sovereign land (The Great Salt Lake is considered sovereign land) a misdemeanor for “trespassing.” Are we headed toward the Great Salt Lake being transformed into a toxic lithium field, eating up all of our freshwater that is being drained into the lake?
The Great Salt Lake: A Dead Sea or a Death Trap?
On May 22, 2019, U. S. Secretary of Agriculture, Sonny Perdue, and Utah Governor, Gary R. Herbert, signed a Shared Stewardship agreement, which included an investment of up to $20 million, where the state of Utah and the Utah Forest Service would commit to protecting Utah watersheds. Legislation appropriated $40 million of tax payer dollars to Brad Wilson to research the Great Salt Lake to find ways to save the ever drying lake. That $40 million was given to the Utah Department of Fire & Forestry who is responsible for giving grants to those who will find ways to save the birds and the water levels of the lake.
When I filed a GRAMA request, I was told by the same department that our money is being granted, not to local scientists and researchers to study the lake, but to The Nature Conservancy and the National Audubon Society to create and lead a water trust. Both organizations were founded by, and are still run by, the Rockefeller Brothers Fund. Kate James, the Board Director of the Audubon Society, was also the Chief Communications Officer for the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. Board member, Jean-François Ducrest, is involved in projects with several NGO’s in Geneva, Switzerland, where the World Economic Forum is headquartered. Director, Susan Bell, also has several nefarious connections including the Sierra Club. The Sierra Club is funded by Soros and Rockefeller and they are responsible for buying up land and gifting it to the government.
The Nature Conservancy is not only partnered with the United Nations, but also claims to care about the environment while they are heavily invested in natural gas, oil, and other mining and earn money from an oil well on land that it controls in Texas.
Is this where we want our tax dollars going in the name of saving the Great Salt Lake? To corrupt, global elitist organizations who are partnered with the United Nations and the World Economic Forum? Organizations who are on record talking about killing off one-third of the world population and contriving food and water shortages to control the masses? Organizations who make themselves rich off of investing in our tax dollars while we see no financial gain or return? To the Rockefellers who are famous for funding Hitler’s Holocaust and Auschwitz’ angel of death?
If that doesn’t boil your blood, this next part will. In fact, it will make you sick.
Utah’s Proclamation of its New Dictatorship
While farmers, and those in rural areas, are intentionally being left to leaking irrigation canals, water banks are being forced on rural dwellers, massive amounts of water are going to data cooling centers for financial investment, massive amounts of water are being used for development of new affordable housing construction, and our water is being drained into a dead sea to intentionally be evaporated for unnecessary reasons, our governor showed his true colors. In full authoritarian and dictatorship spirit, not only did Spencer Cox come out and encourage us to report our neighbors and friends for “wasting water,” he also released a new Proclamation, without legislative approval, ordering our clean water supply to be drained into the Great Salt Lake. This proclamation suspends our water rights so that any unclaimed rights will be diverted into a dead sea for other countries, including several of our enemies who wish to see us dead, to lay claim to those water rights instead. This includes several water sources but I wanted to take a quick second to mention that it also includes Bear River. If you haven’t been following Utah Rivers Council, you should. They have been fighting our state government, for some time now, because they don’t want their source of water, Bear River, to be diverted to the Great Salt Lake. They have even published several alternative ideas for the state to use so that their water does not need to be taken from them. They also don’t want to have to pay for the development of a water pipeline from the river to the lake. However, they would be forced to pay for the project through a raise in their property taxes during ever growing inflation and financial hardships. You want to know whose water rights will not be affected by this? According to the Utah Department of Natural Resources, whose Director was appointed by Cox, “The proclamation does not affect US Magnesium Corporation’s pending application for a canal expansion into the lake, which was submitted prior to the governor’s direction.” This means that their application for 100,000 gallons of water per minute, for magnesium, potash, and lithium mining, will not be affected.
Of course, this proclamation has the blessing of our Speaker of House, Brad Wilson, and our Speaker of Senate, Stuart Adams. No surprise there considering Brad Wilson was the one who handed over $40 million of our tax dollars to the Rockefeller Brothers Fund. As a side note: Brad Wilson also owns several investments in housing corporations, including Destination Homes which he co-founded, which uses our water for development as well.
This proclamation isn’t the only thing repulsive about this entire situation. Dictator Cox also released this video encouraging everyone to report their neighbor if they are seen “wasting water.” He states that it will be a “three strikes you’re out kind of deal” where, if you’re caught using too much water, you will have your secondary water forcefully shut off on you. Any of your neighbors, who are also connected to that water meter, will also have their water shut off on them. They won’t have a choice. He encourages all counties to "enforce" shutting off secondary water supply, via the smart secondary water meters, to force us into compliance. He then states that this should be encouragement to report your neighbor when you see them wasting water. Here is the website where you can report your friends and family for water waste. Are you OK with all of these strict and authoritative restrictions to our water use and consumption, while at the same time, we are being forced to give all the water we are “conserving” to the state for mining? For money and greed? When that water goes to our enemy while we go without?
Our state legislators just passed a bill requiring all districts to install secondary water metering by 2030. You can read H.B. 242 or you can also read about it in several different news articles including this one and this one. If you don’t know about the smart water meters and smart water infrastructure that I have been talking about, you are going to want to go back and read my first water blog. As a reminder, these are connected to smart piping and they will be able to digitally shut you off to water whenever they want to. They are starting to push smart irrigation as well which would shut off our farmers to water at the push of a button. The Utah Climate Center was developed in partnership with the Bureau of Reclamation for their waterSMART project. So, the federal government is also implementing their new green deal plans into our state water infrastructure. You will commonly hear this referred to as “green water,” “smart water,” or “water smart”.
As a reminder, our Rainwater Harvesting Act and Storm Water Amendments require us to register to collect rainwater on our own property and only allow us to collect up to 2,700 gallons of rainwater for productive use. The rest is to go into the ground or it is theft. All other water belongs to the state including puddles in the street and if we take water we don’t have permission to collect, and haven’t registered that location to collect from, it is theft. These bills are already state code and they can activate them at any point they like. New proposed bills, to be voted on during general session of 2023, include the Emergency Water Shortages Amendments which, as I mentioned earlier, would give the state/governor the authority to interrupt water usage and take or damage private property in order to do so, including crops. Another would have us pay for water usage per capita (usage per person) instead of through property taxes; meaning water would become a lot more expensive. It also means that they would need to have a way to monitor how many people live with you and, via registration, who lives with you. Is this starting to seem like a complete breach of privacy to you? Even another bill would change the word “ditch” and “canal,” along with wells and other sources of water to the legal term of “water facility,” and any attempt to take water from these “water facilities” would result in criminal charges; in some cases, third degree felonies.
Not only this, but our state strategic plans show that our legislators and governor’s cabinet members, favor being able to shut us off to hot water whenever they deem necessary as well.
Government owned community gardens and green spaces, digitally controlled water systems that can be shut off on you without your permission, the paralyzing of our farmers and their ability to water their crops, complete regulatory overreach of our own personal livestock, gardens, greenhouses, fruit stands, nurseries, etc., the forced grading of our grain along with the expense that comes with it, farmers’ water right preferences coming in last while commercial agriculture gets priority spot #4 on the priority list, corrupt politicians stealing our water, threatening us to report our neighbors… Is this painting a picture for you yet? Is it painting a picture of a story that we have seen played out in our history before?
Water Police
In California, the EPA is now forcing residents to pay a $300 annual fee for using more than 2 acre feet of water, from their own wells on their own land, and they are now being forced to water meter their wells. This means that their wells are now digitally controlled as well. Chris Scheuing, a California attorney for the California Farm Bureau Federation, admits that the people of California don’t want this. However, his attitude is one of force disregarding the rights and freedoms of We the People owning the land and the water. He admits that there is resistance to this from the people stating that “Even the most mild-mannered farmers are not particularly happy about some new white government pickup truck driving onto your property,” but that “sustainable groundwater management is now the law of the land.”
In Nevada, they have official “water police” who drive around neighborhoods and take video evidence of water being “wasted” such as lawn sprinklers leaking onto sidewalks. The video shows the house and home address, along with the water being used, as evidence for water waste. It is literally documented as if it’s a crime. You can watch this being done in this video at about minute marker 15:17. You will also notice that their golf courses are allowed to be watered, but their lawns are all ripped out.
Is this where Utah is also headed?
Give Me Liberty or Give Me Death
This is ringing more true than ever right now: dictators don’t have to work very hard to convince you to hand over your rights and sell yourself into slavery. All they have to do is convince you that you are doing it for your own safety or for convenience, or for the good of the community or the "whole". Stalin said that, “They will let you do anything to them if you are the one who controls the food.” To control the food supply, you must control the water. To control the water supply is total control. When you’ve been shut off to water for three days, what rights will you be willing to give up for a few drops of water? Are we falling for the tricks of Stalin and Hitler? Or are we the ones who say “No” and fight back? Do we accept slavery on our knees, kneeling to our new masters? Or do we learn from our history and choose to stand?
It’s time to remind them who works for who. It’s time to remind them that, no matter how many times they label themselves as an “authority,” that they are no more than public servants and we still see them as such. It’s time that they realize that the masses are waking up and that we see them. The need to recognize that we aren’t going to put up with their tyrannical overreach with these unconstitutional laws anymore. Most importantly, it’s time to fix things for our children so that their future isn’t stolen from them. We have a choice to either step up now, and make our forefathers proud, or we can choose to put our heads in the sand and watch what they gave to us, paid for with their own blood, slip through our fingertips. It’s time to stand up and fight for our freedoms, and for the freedoms of our children, and it’s about time that we reinstitute that beloved document called our Constitution. They are guilty of treason; we need to start calling it just that and they need to hear those words spoken out loud.
I’ll be at the Capitol this January through March, during general legislative session, to put them on notice. I hope to see you there.
Let’s take our home back.