"It's obvious that southern Nevada is in a critical need to develop water if they're going to continue to grow. I don't deny that," Baker said. "It's important to the state of Nevada to keep Las Vegas healthy and growing.

"But to spend their time and the billions of dollars trying to develop a system that to me is logically wrong, scientifically wrong and morally wrong doesn't make any sense."

The citizens group, in addition to staging events like the one next week, has taken its cause before elected officials at the local and state levels and pledges to continue.

Mulroy urged calm, saying that what information is out there is preliminary, that the BLM is doing its work, and that the debate raging in Nevada and, increasingly, in Utah, is counterproductively emotional.

"I understand the emotional outpouring that this march on Salt Lake City represents," she said. "But it's just that — an emotional outpouring. There are studies and analyses that have to be conducted. Once there is a sense of what water is available, and how safe it is to take out, then — based on the facts — the state engineer will make a determination. And he's been very conservative."

The process still has years to go. An agreement with Lincoln County, in which the county and water authority would share pipeline capacity, is in the works. If completed, that agreement would require a new environmental impact study. And that means at least three years to completion.

In the meantime, Mulroy said the authority is willing to sit down with residents of White Pine County, which includes part of Snake Valley, to assure them of the authority's willingness to involve citizens in the process.

"We have said we'd like to sit down with White Pine County and enter into an agreement, wherein we agree that there will be a review of water rights in 75 years. That's a big deal in the West," Mulroy said. "To see if environmentally, another 50 to 75 years can be sustained. And if White Pine County needed those resources, we'd turn the water back over to the county."

The water authority also has offered a year-to-year evaluation, looking at more immediate impacts of water development in the area. And if circumstances warranted — in the event of a drought, for example — Mulroy said the water authority would stop pumping to let the area recover.

There are mitigation strategies to limit the effect of pumping on existing water users, according to the authority, along with multiple safeguards against environmental damage and plans for economic compensation if residents suffer losses. But much of this discussion gets squelched under the weight of emotion, Mulroy said, leaving the county's key players wary to engage.