KVIG Informative

Nevada’s slice of the Colorado River is already shrinking under federal shortage declarations, and starting Jan. 1, 2027, state law will bar many Las Vegas Valley properties from using any of that water on grass that nobody walks on, sits on or plays on.

The Southern Nevada Water Authority launched its Water Smart Landscapes rebate program in 1999, paying residents and businesses to replace grass with water-efficient landscaping. The program has helped convert 250 million square feet of lawn since then, saving the community roughly 203 billion gallons of water, according to the water authority’s own account of the program.

Under the program’s current rates, residential customers receive $5 per square foot for the first 10,000 square feet of grass converted and $2.50 per square foot beyond that in a fiscal year, according to the water authority. Businesses, homeowners associations and multifamily properties receive $5 per square foot for the first 10,000 square feet and $1.50 per square foot after that, the authority says. The Las Vegas Valley Water District adds $2 per square foot on top of those rates, and the city of Henderson adds a separate $575 rebate for eligible customers, according to the same source.

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The 2021 Nevada Legislature moved the program from incentive to mandate. Assembly Bill No. 356, sponsored by the Assembly Committee on Ways and Means during the Legislature’s 81st session, bars the water authority from delivering Colorado River water to irrigate nonfunctional turf on any property not zoned exclusively for single-family residential use, starting Jan. 1, 2027, according to the bill’s own archived text.

The Legislature directed formation of a nine-member Nonfunctional Turf Removal Advisory Committee in June 2021 to define functional and nonfunctional turf and develop a removal plan, according to the water authority. The water authority’s board approved the committee’s recommendations in January 2022.

Functional turf must serve a recreational purpose, sit at least 10 feet from streets and rest on a slope under 25 percent under those definitions, the water authority says. Nonfunctional turf includes grass along streets, sidewalks, driveways, medians and roundabouts, and most building-adjacent landscaping on property not zoned exclusively for single-family residences.

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Properties affected by the law must submit removal plans by Dec. 31, 2026, one day before the irrigation ban takes effect, according to the water authority. Single-family homes are exempt from the mandate entirely. Roughly 1,000 acres of nonfunctional turf remain on residential properties that the law does not reach, the water authority says, leaving that conversion dependent on the same rebate program that has run voluntarily since 1999.

A rebate program that spent a quarter-century asking Southern Nevada to voluntarily give up its grass now has a legal deadline attached to it. Covered properties have until Dec. 31, 2026, to submit removal plans, and one day later, the water authority’s Colorado River allocation stops being available for grass no one uses at all.