We’re wrapping up a series exploring how communities in Kansas Groundwater Management District #1 are working together to address water challenges and protect water for future generations. Throughout the series, you’ll hear from local leaders, producers and scientists who are turning conversations and real-world decisions into long-term solutions.

In the final story, we look at what happens if we actually get this right, and what does the future look like if Q-Stable becomes the norm. For State Representative Jim Minnix.. that future is more than just water levels. Be sure to listen to the companion podcast at the end of the article. 

Stability for the Next Generation

As groundwater management efforts continue across western Kansas, attention is shifting from implementation to what long-term stability could mean for the communities that depend on it. In Groundwater Management District #1 (GMD1), that future is increasingly tied to one concept: Q-Stable — a balance between water use and what the Ogallala Aquifer can sustain over time.

For Rep. Jim Minnix, success is not just about reaching that benchmark, but what it allows communities to maintain.

“Success out in GMD1 is when we can get to Q-Stable, maintain our economy, welcome our youth back to the community, and look forward to a good future,” Minnix said.

Supporting More than Agriculture

While irrigation accounts for the majority of water use in the region, Minnix said the
impact of water stability extends well beyond production agriculture.01D

“There’s lots of jobs out here that don’t entail driving a tractor,” he said. “We need those people in our communities to keep everything running.”

Local economies, schools and small businesses are all closely tied to agricultural activity and the water that supports it.

“It benefits everybody,” said Katie Durham, district manager for GMD1. “People who farm out in the country live in town, pay into the tax base, and support those communities. It’s all tightly connected.”

A Generational Shift

Minnix said the next generation of producers will play a key role in continuing that progress.

“It’s going to take young people to keep up with everything, keep an open mind, and be early adopters of things that make scientific sense,” he said.

Advancements in irrigation technology and data-driven decision making are already changing how water is managed on individual operations. Durham said many producers are making decisions today with future generations in mind.

“There’s a lot of producers in this region that have young children who want to take over the family farm,” she said. “Making changes now is what allows that to happen.”

Building on Years of Progress

Efforts to address aquifer decline in western Kansas have been developing for decades. Minnix said conversations around water use and conservation date back as far as the 1990s, with more structured tools becoming available in the early 2010s.

“I wish we’d started things 40 years ago, but we’re light years ahead of some other areas,” he said.

Local Decisions Remain Key

Both Minnix and Durham emphasized that long-term success depends on locally driven solutions. The Ogallala Aquifer varies significantly across the region, meaning water availability and management strategies differ from one area to another.

“Every township is unique in what the Ogallala is underneath,” Minnix said. “So it’s going to take local people to come up with what needs to happen in a specific area.”

Durham said that localized approach has helped build trust and participation.

“People want to be heard and be part of the process,” she said. “When they understand the data and the options, they want to be part of the solution.”

Signs of Stability

In some parts of GMD1, water use has already approached Q-Stable levels, offering a glimpse of what long-term sustainability could look like. Minnix pointed to areas like Wichita County, where reductions have been achieved while maintaining economic activity.

“They’ve maintained their economy. They’ve maintained their population. Their businesses are doing well,” he said.

At the same time, challenges such as drought conditions and market fluctuations remain a factor in year-to-year outcomes.

Looking Ahead

For Minnix, the long-term goal is to ensure that communities in western Kansas remain viable for future generations.

“I want to see the sixth generation raised and thrive here,” he said.

Reaching and maintaining Q-Stable, he said, offers a path toward slowing aquifer decline while preserving economic stability.

A Shared Responsibility and the Path Forward

As efforts continue, both policymakers and local leaders emphasize that water management is not owned by any one group, it’s a shared responsibility. For Minnix, that responsibility is rooted in something bigger than policy.

“It belongs to the people of Kansas and the next generation,” Minnix said.

He emphasized that the resource must be managed with long-term stewardship in mind,  not just for today’s producers, but for the communities that depend on it tomorrow.

While the work toward Q-Stable is ongoing, leaders say progress in GMD1 is proof that coordinated efforts between producers, local boards and state leadership can make a measurable difference. The focus now is sustaining that momentum — aligning water use, economic stability and community vitality for the long term.

And at the center of it all is a simple truth:

“Water is life,” Minnix said. “It’s what keeps our communities here.”

 

To hear more from Rep. Jim Minnix, listen to the episode below.

 

We’re continuing a series exploring how communities in Kansas Groundwater Management District #1 are working together to address water challenges and protect water for future generations. Throughout the series, you’ll hear from local leaders, producers and scientists who are turning conversations and real-world decisions into long-term solutions.

This story is about results and rewards: what success looks like when Q-Stable moves from an idea into something measurable and when the numbers start to change. Be sure to listen to the companion podcast at the end of the article. 

Results and Rewards

In groundwater management, success rarely shows up all at once. It shows up slowly, through data, adjustments, and decisions that start adding up over time. For Wes McCary, technology projects coordinator with the Kansas Water Office, those small changes are where real progress toward Q-Stable begins.

“Q-Stable is a metric,” McCary said. “Then we have to figure out the ways and means to achieve Q-Stable.”

McCary works on the technology side of water management: feasibility studies, pilot projects, system evaluations, and tools that help producers and water managers understand how water is actually being used, and how efficiently it’s being turned into economic value.

“I’m trying to sit in the middle and bring it together,” he said.

That balance matters in western Kansas, where groundwater isn’t just an agricultural input, it’s the foundation of entire communities.

“Our only water supply — municipal, domestic, irrigation, stock, and industrial —is dependent on the Ogallala Aquifer,” said Katie Durham, district manager for Western Kansas Groundwater Management District #1 (GMD1).

What “Results” Actually Mean

When talking about results and rewards, McCary says success depends on perspective.

“If you’re talking about irrigators and producers,” he said, “they want to continue to irrigate. They want a return on investment.”

That return, he explained, comes down to what he calls water duty, not just how much water is pumped, but how efficiently those gallons are converted into dollars.

“Am I 50 percent efficient? Sixty? Ninety?” McCary said. “That’s what producers define as winning.”

For water managers, success looks different. Durham often describes Q-Stable as a water budget, a way to understand how much water is available, how much is being used, and what the Ogallala Aquifer can realistically sustain over time.

“You want to find an equilibrium where you’re not pumping more than the aquifer is able to maintain,” Durham said.

Q-Stable, McCary said, is the first statewide framework that allows both perspectives to exist together, from individual wells to entire districts.

“We’ve never had a statewide metric that could scale up or down like this,” he said.

A Fitbit for Water

One of the clearest signs of progress, McCary said, is how producers respond once they have better information.

Over the past 18 months, nearly 200 irrigation system evaluations have been completed across the High Plains Aquifer in Kansas, with roughly 130 to 140 conducted in GMD1 alone. Those assessments examine wells, power plants, pivots, and uniformity across fields, identifying inefficiencies that often go unnoticed.

“It’s like getting a health checkup,” McCary said. “Or wearing a Fitbit. Am I on target? Am I off target? What are my trends?”

What those evaluations consistently reveal, he said, is opportunity.

“We’ve found that we’re leaving dollars on the table,” he said.

Not because producers are careless, but because many systems were built decades ago and maintained just well enough to keep running.

“We’re literally running on 30- and 40-year-old technology in a lot of cases,” McCary said. “You can only re-machine and re-sleeve that stuff so many times.”

Durham says that kind of data-driven insight is what helps ease fear around change.

“At first, conversations around conservation were off-putting,” she said. “But once people understood the data and realized they had a say in how plans were developed, that helped build trust.”

From Awareness to Action

The shift McCary sees isn’t just technical, it’s psychological. Producers who receive system evaluations don’t feel punished or pressured, he said. They feel empowered.

“Nobody’s lecturing them,” McCary said. “Nobody’s doing a data grab.”

Instead, evaluations are paired with targeted cost-share dollars that allow producers to fix specific problems without carrying the full financial burden themselves.

“That’s a win-win,” he said.

Just as important, the evaluations establish a baseline and a way to measure improvement over time.

“After changes are made, we go back and re-measure,” McCary said. “Have I actually improved?”

Durham says seeing those improvements, especially from neighbors, helps momentum build.

“When people see their neighbors make it work, using less water and still producing strong yields, that word of mouth is incredibly impactful,” she said.

Growing Momentum

McCary is careful not to speak for the district’s official metrics, but he says the momentum in GMD1 is clear. Producers are using evaluation reports to guide upgrades, retiring inefficiencies, and in some cases investing their own dollars beyond available cost-share funds.

“We have large operations going out and doing self-assessments now,” he said. “They want to know how all of their systems are performing.”

That shift toward tracking, measuring, and reassessing is critical for efforts toward Q-Stable and long-term stabilization, especially in areas where users must move together toward shared, locally informed targets.

“You can’t have some people pulling harder than others,” McCary said. “That’s how you end up with a tragedy of the commons.”

The Real Reward: Control

For McCary, the biggest reward of stabilizing water use isn’t a single metric, it’s control.

“The fate’s in their own hands,” he said. “Either play fourth-quarter football or stand a bigger chance of losing.”

He’s blunt about the stakes. There’s only so much water available, and older systems and habits can only be stretched so far.

“We kicked the can down the road for two or three generations,” McCary said. “This generation has to decide whether we fix the problem or keep patching it.”

That decision affects more than individual operations. In western Kansas, groundwater underpins entire communities, something Durham says keeps the focus on the long term.

“It’s important that we stabilize and slow down depletion so we have resources for future generations,” she said.

Becoming the Heroes of the Story

McCary believes Kansas has an opportunity many regions don’t, a culture of measurement, accountability, and local decision-making already in place.

“If we do this right,” he said, “we don’t get labeled as the depleters of the aquifer.”

Instead, agriculture becomes part of the solution.

“We get to be the heroes of our own story,” McCary said. “We saw a problem, we addressed it, and we won.”

 

To hear more from Wes McCary, listen to the episode below. In the final story, we explore what the future of water looks like in western Kansas.

 

We’re continuing a series exploring how communities in Kansas Groundwater Management District #1 are working together to address water challenges and protect water for future generations. Throughout the series, you’ll hear from local leaders, producers and scientists who are  turning conversations and real-world decisions into long-term solutions.

In this second story, we’re talking about how information sparks conversations and turns into real-world action on the ground. Be sure to listen to the companion podcast at the end of the article. 

Awareness and Conversations

Groundwater is hard to talk about until it stops being abstract.

For many landowners in western Kansas, the first “spark” doesn’t come from a report or a headline. It comes from something closer to home: a well that doesn’t recover as quickly, pumping that gets more expensive, or a nagging sense that the resource underneath them isn’t as reliable as it used to be.

That’s where Brownie Wilson often enters the picture.

Wilson manages the Applications and Services Unit for the Geohydrology and Geohealth Division at the Kansas Geological Survey (KGS), a state agency housed at the University of Kansas that serves as a science-based resource for communities and decision-makers across the state.

“We process information and collect the data, and then we turn around and help support the scientific research,” Wilson said. “We do everything from water quality to water levels, and we provide that support to the research that goes on here at the Kansas Geological Survey.”

A Science-based View of a Very Local Problem

KGS works across a wide range of Kansas geology, but groundwater is one of its most visible roles, especially in the west, where the High Plains Aquifer system underpins irrigation and rural life.

In Kansas, Wilson said, the western third of the state is largely considered the Ogallala portion of the High Plains Aquifer.

“Typically the Ogallala is in a state of decline,” he said. “It just kind of depends on how fast that decline is, and what drives that really is the pumping.”

What surprises some people, Wilson said, is what doesn’t drive the trend.

“It’s not so much recharge and rainfall,” he said. “Whether there’s rain or not, determines if the aquifer is pumped more or less.”

In other words: wet years can reduce demand. Dry years can intensify it. And the aquifer reflects those choices.

A Record Measured Well by Well

Kansas has been tracking groundwater levels across the High Plains for decades. The annual measurement network began under the U.S. Geological Survey, and in 1996 the Kansas Geological Survey took over administration of the program.

Today, KGS cooperates with the Kansas Department of Agriculture’s Division of Water Resources through what they call the Cooperative Water Level Network.

Starting each winter, teams head out across the region to measure water levels in about 1,400 wells.

“We try to go to the same wells year after year after year,” Wilson said, “so that we get an idea of: is it going up, or down, or staying the same.”

The work is logistically intense and sometimes weather-dependent.

““Cooperative weather makes the work easier, but it can get more challenging when conditions like snow or mud are on the ground.” Wilson said.

Even when everything goes smoothly, he said, the measurements themselves are quick.

“If it all goes well, it takes 15 minutes to measure the well,” Wilson said. “Million-dollar decisions are being made off those results.”

Some Declines Hit Harder than Others

When Wilson looks at the data over time, the most important lesson isn’t just that the Ogallala is declining. It’s that the impact isn’t uniform.

“You might have some areas where you say, ‘Ooh, the water levels are really dropping there,’ but they might have a fair amount of water in supply,” he said.

Meanwhile, other areas may show smaller year-to-year drops, but face bigger consequences.

“The groundwater isn’t dropping that much,” he said, “but if that aquifer is already pretty thin, those little declines might be having a much bigger impact on the overall resource.”

That’s one reason early awareness matters. Landowners can’t assume conditions in one township match the next.

Making the Underground Visible

Because groundwater is out of sight, Wilson said the challenge isn’t just measuring change, it’s communicating it.

A single number rarely lands the way people expect.

“If you say, ‘your water levels dropped by X number of feet this year,’ that may or may not resonate,” he said.

But when the same data is mapped and shown over time, it becomes easier to grasp.

“With GIS, you can actually see things in space,” Wilson said. “Everybody likes to look in their backyard, but then you can compare it to what your neighbors look like in the surrounding counties.”

The real power comes when water-level trends are tied to something landowners can immediately relate to: time.

“If declines happen continuously,” he said, “this is how many years we think you have until that aquifer starts to drop off and that becomes more impactful.”

Especially when the timeline overlaps with something very practical.

“That might be within you and I’s lifespan,” he said, “or more importantly, within the lifetime of a farm loan.”

The First Questions People Ask

When producers see water data, especially when it’s shown for their area, Wilson says the same questions often come up first.

“They ask: what are the other states doing?” he said. “Or who’s up the hill? Is it Colorado, or is it the other county up the road?”

There’s often an assumption that groundwater behaves like surface water.

It does, but only at a much slower pace..

“Groundwater moves so slowly,” Wilson said. “We’re talking a foot per day, or every four days, years and sometimes decades just to go a mile.”

For landowners, that can be an important shift: the biggest influence isn’t what’s happening far away. It’s what’s happening nearby.

“The biggest impact we have on the aquifer is what happens right here in our own state, our own neighborhood, our own county,” he said.

The “Aha” Moment

That’s where Q-Stable conversations — a locally led approach to groundwater management focused on balancing water use with recharge over time — can help shift the tone.

Wilson said one of the clearest “aha” moments comes when water-level change and water use are shown together in a straightforward budget.

“We can show those relationships in a budget form,” Wilson said. “This is your aquifer budget for the next decade or two.”

When producers see that relationship, he said, it becomes less theoretical.

“When you use this much water, you can see this is what the water levels do,” he said. “And if you conserve or save that water, you can see how that improves the declines.”

Then, over time, the effect becomes visible even though the aquifer is underground.

“The next year or two,” he said, “they can see: I have been saving water and you can show me, with the data, that conservation is making a positive impact on my water levels.”

Neutral Information Builds Trust

Katie Durham, district manager for Western Kansas Groundwater Management District #1, says those early moments matter because they start a different kind of conversation, one rooted in understanding, not fear.

Durham has emphasized that Q-Stable works best when communities can see their local data and talk openly about what it means, noting the values are localized estimations. She said those conversations help build understanding, strengthen local ownership, and ultimately create buy-in.

Wilson sees KGS’s role as especially valuable in that space because it isn’t regulatory.

“We’re not a regulatory agency,” he said. “We don’t have any hammers. We’re just answering to the numbers.”

That neutrality, he said, helps build trust.

“We don’t have an agenda other than striving for good-quality science and informing decision makers,” Wilson said. “I like to think people appreciate that.”

Awareness Is Where Change Starts

Wilson said people often underestimate how much difference an individual operation can make, until they see how change can spread.

He compared it to voting.

“You’ve got all these people that have to vote to make a difference,” he said. “That’s kind of the same with the aquifer.”

One person may feel small. A neighborhood doesn’t.

“If you have a few more, you and your neighbors, you absolutely can make a change in your neighborhood,” he said. “And maybe that grows a little bit bigger.”

For Durham, the journey begins before any formal program or plan.

It begins when someone sees the numbers, asks the first questions, and decides it’s time to talk about what comes next.

 

To hear more from Brownie Wilson, listen to the episode below. In the next story, we explore what happens when a producer is ready to take action and how playas fit into water conservation efforts.

 

We’re kicking off a new series exploring how communities in Kansas Groundwater Management District #1 are working together to address water challenges and protect water for future generations. Throughout the series, you’ll hear from local leaders, producers, and scientists who are turning conversations and real-world decisions into long-term solutions.

In this first story, we’re setting the stage by explaining the challenges facing western Kansas, the goal moving forward, and a term you’ll hear often throughout this series: Q-Stable. Be sure to listen to the companion podcast at the end of the article. 

Why Q-Stable Matters

In western Kansas, water isn’t a background issue. It’s the issue.

It determines whether crops can be grown, whether livestock operations can operate or even expand, and whether small towns can count on a reliable drinking water supply. And for a region with limited surface water, it also determines what the next generation inherits.

That’s why Katie Durham, district manager for Western Kansas Groundwater Management District #1 (GMD1), says the push toward “Q-Stable” isn’t a slogan. It’s a practical way to talk about what it will take to keep the Ogallala Aquifer viable for the people who depend on it.

“Our district faces both water quality and water quantity problems, mainly water quantity,” Durham said. “We’re hyper-focused on addressing the decline in the aquifer and making sure we have water left for future generations, for agricultural purposes, municipal purposes, industrial use, stock water. All of those things are tightly woven together.”

A Region Built on Groundwater

GMD1 covers roughly 1.1 million acres across parts of Wallace, Lane, Greeley, Scott and Wichita counties — a landscape of small communities and wide-open production agriculture where the largest town is only about 4,000 people.

In places like this, Durham said, water isn’t just an input for irrigation. It’s the foundation under nearly every piece of the local economy.

“Our communities are so hyper-focused on agriculture economically,” she said. “It’s really important that we plan to have that resource available in the future.”

That planning starts with being honest about what aquifer decline looks like in real life and with clearing up a misunderstanding she hears often.

“People typically think it’s a bathtub underneath the ground, and that we’re all drawing from exactly the same kind of aquifer system,” Durham said. “And it’s just not.”

Not a Bathtub

Even within a short drive, groundwater conditions can shift dramatically. Durham described the Ogallala in this part of Kansas as a patchwork, where geology changes from county to county and sometimes faster than that.

“The boundaries of the western groundwater districts look odd on a map because they’re tightly mirrored around the Ogallala that comes into Kansas,” she said. “It’s not the same in our area as it is in other districts. It’s not continuous.”

That matters because the physical makeup of the aquifer isn’t uniform.

“The bedrock changes quite a bit,” Durham said. “The material in the aquifer changes very quickly in a lot of areas. You might have better sands and gravels in some places and less productive material in others.”

Those differences affect two things producers feel immediately: how much water is available and how well it can be used.

Durham explained that “saturated thickness”, the amount of water-bearing material in the aquifer, is one of the clearest on-the-ground indicators of supply.

“Saturated thickness basically equates to available water supply,” she said. “And then there’s the gallon-per-minute rate you experience in that individual area.”

In plain terms: some wells decline faster, some produce less, and some areas have less room for error, even if they’re only a few miles apart.

About More than Irrigation

In western Kansas, the Ogallala Aquifer is the primary source of water not only for irrigation, but also for municipalities, rural domestic wells, livestock operations and industry.

“In our area in particular, we don’t have surface water,” Durham said. “Our only water supply — municipal, domestic, irrigation, stock, and industrial — is dependent on the Ogallala.”

That reliance is exactly why Durham says stabilization matters. If the aquifer continues to decline, the ripple effects go far beyond one operation.

“It’s important that we slow down the depletion and get to a place of stabilization,” she said, “so that we have resources for future generations.”

Durham also emphasized that the conversation can’t stay stuck in blame, especially when many producers will be the first to tell you they didn’t have today’s data when irrigation development accelerated decades ago.

“We’re beyond pointing fingers,” she said. “We just have more science now and more technology now. The focus has to be: how do we move forward?”

What Is “Q-Stable”?

Durham described Q-Stable as a straightforward concept built from strong data: a water budget.

Kansas collects extensive groundwater information, including annual water-level measurements taken each winter, water-use data, and monitoring data from systems that can track well performance frequently over time.

Durham said, “Q-Stable essentially is a water budget — comparing what’s available, how much is being extracted, and how much is returning through recharge and lateral inflows. It’s a regional estimate that can change over time, serving as a locally driven decision-making tool and directional goalpost as a directional target for stabilizing the aquifer rather than a fixed number. It’s designed to help communities and producers evaluate options, guide farmer-driven decisions at the local level, and it must be supported by ongoing monitoring and locally driven management decisions that also account for economic and other factors.”

The goal is equilibrium: a point where long-term use matches what the aquifer can reasonably sustain.

“You want to find an equilibrium where you’re not pumping or extracting more than you’re able to maintain or recharge,” she said.

Durham noted that Q-Stable doesn’t try to rank which use is more important. It is simply an accounting of what the aquifer can supply over time and whether current use is trending toward stability or depletion.

“It’s just looking at the resource,” she said. “How much of the resource is being used in these regions and what is still available.”

The Pressure Point

In GMD1, Durham said the biggest lever for stabilization is also the most sensitive one.

“Overall water use in our area, closer to 97% of total use, is irrigation,” she said. “The rest is divided between municipal, stock water and some industrial.”

That signals meaningful progress on stabilization requires changes in irrigation use, but Durham is careful to frame that reality alongside the economic stakes.

“The goal becomes: how are you able to reduce that, but not economically endanger our communities that are so dependent on agriculture?” she said. “How do you reduce water use in a way that allows producers to still produce a good crop?”

For Durham, that question is the bridge between data and people. It’s also why she says solutions must be local.

“These plans are not a one-shoe-size-fits-all solution,” she said. “They need to be developed by each local community, because the local aquifer system is so dynamic and our economics are so dynamic.”

Locally Driven change

Kansas’ Local Enhanced Management Areas, or LEMAs, are one example of that local approach. Durham said early conversations around conservation often ran into fear, especially fear of losing control.

“A lot of producers had heard rumors of huge changes,” she said. “At first it was off-putting. It was coming from fear of the unknown.”

Over time, she said the tone shifted as producers understood two things: the numbers were based on real, local data, and they would have a voice in shaping how reductions worked.

“When people saw it was individualized, but they were all doing it together, that helped,” Durham said.

Durham said that variability is exactly why locally driven management tools like LEMAs are critical when working toward Q-Stable. “That is why it is so important to have the LEMAs and the ability to address what we see in the data over time, at the local level,” she said. “Within Wichita County, for example, there are areas that were already at estimated Q-Stable values before the LEMA, areas that have achieved estimated Q-Stable values within the LEMA, and areas that still have more work to do.”

She explained that those differences highlight how dynamic groundwater conditions can be, even within a single county. “That is how variable the numbers are, and how much they change across different counties throughout the GMD,” Durham said. “That is also why working so closely with the Kansas Geological Survey, and participating in efforts like Airborne Electromagnetic Mapping or GMD3’s ICARE regions, are such important initiatives.”

Durham emphasized that Q-Stable should be viewed as a flexible, data-driven target shaped by local input and economic realities.

“We think of Q-Stable as a general estimated direction, a locally used planning tool and set of goal posts that help guide farmer-driven decisions and then proceed by utilizing public input and local control through the LEMAs in identifying how quickly we can reasonably get to that goal while taking economics into consideration.”

She also sees a cultural shift underway, driven by families thinking long-term, and notes that Kansas is somewhat unique in its grassroots approach to water policy — where locally driven decision-making plays a critical role in building adoption and support for LEMA plans within agricultural communities.

“There’s a lot of producers in this region that have young children,” she said. “They want those family members to be able to take over the family farm. And to make that possible, they realize they have to make changes now.”

One Neighbor’s Example

Durham said one of the most powerful forces in water conservation isn’t a policy document, it’s word-of-mouth.

She described a producer who entered a five-year plan and initially tried to treat the water allocation like a simple annual budget. In year one, he used far more than he intended and panicked.

“He realized: how am I going to budget the remaining four years when I already did this in year one?” she said.

That moment pushed him to try new strategies, including technology that helped improve irrigation timing and planning. Neighbors noticed when his pivot wasn’t running and called to ask if something was wrong.

“And he had to say: yes, I’m aware,” Durham said. “I’m just trusting the process.”

The following year, she said, he used significantly less water while producing a strong crop and then told his neighbors what changed.

“The first thing he did was go tell all his friends and neighbors,” she said. “And a lot of those individuals came into the office and said: what tools are out there?”

For Durham, that’s the turning point: when conservation becomes a shared community practice, not a private experiment.

“That kind of sharing of experience was, and continues to be, very impactful,” she said.

Education, Options and Navigation

Durham described GMD1’s role as equal parts educator and translator, helping producers understand their own data, sort through programs, and connect with resources that change year to year.

“A lot of it is education,” she said. “We do a lot of one-on-one consultations.”

Sometimes that begins with required reporting, she said, but quickly becomes a longer conversation about what’s available and what might fit a producer’s goals.

“What programs are available? What technologies are we seeing? What cost-share opportunities does the state or federal government have?” she said. “It’s complicated, and it changes every fiscal year.”

GMD1 also participates in efforts like irrigation technology evaluations and upgrades, designed to help producers make systems more efficient and better understand performance at the well level.

On the ground, Durham said that often means helping producers look closely at drawdown, recovery, pressure, efficiency and how those details connect to the bigger picture.

Q-Stable at the Farm Level

Durham emphasized that Q-Stable operates at two scales: the regional scale that tracks sustainability across an area, and the farm scale where decisions are made well by well.

She encouraged producers to build familiarity with their own systems, water levels, well depth, intake points, and how the well responds during pumping.

And she offered a comparison that most people understand immediately.

“You can equate it to looking at your well like your bank account,” Durham said. “If you understand how much you’re pulling out every year, and what that effect is, you’re going to self-regulate and self-identify what estimated stability looks like for your farm.”

Why Now

Durham said the momentum around conservation has grown because producers can see examples of plans working and because confidence in the data continues to increase.

“We’re seeing more and more examples of people that have been able to make it work,” she said. “And we also have data indicating what the aquifer is looking like.”

With better information and more real-world results, she believes more producers are ready to act.

“That empowerment is really critical in getting things moving,” Durham said.

If she could boil the work down to a few words, Durham said it would come back to relationships.

“Human relationships and building that trust,” she said. “Taking the time to sit down with people and listen. People want to be heard. They want to understand what the data says and what the options are.”

And when they do, Durham has seen what happens next.

“It empowers them to be part of the solution,” she said, “and to do it on a local level.”

Durham is direct about the fact that irrigation dominates water use, but she also pushes back on the idea that water sustainability is one group’s responsibility.

“It benefits everybody,” she said. “If you start looking at it as a community rather than one stakeholder group, it’s all tightly connected.”

Looking Forward

Durham hopes future generations understand two things at once: the past was shaped by what people knew at the time, and the future will be shaped by what communities choose to do now.

“My hope would be that future generations look forward instead of backwards,” she said, “and figure out how we use the available resources in the best way possible, so this way of life is available for generations.”

 

To hear more from Katie Durham, listen to the episode below. In the next story, we explore what happens when information sparks conversations and turns into real-world action on the ground.