Teaching and Research Interests
Dr. Megdal, director of the Water Resources Research Center, has held a joint appointment with the Department since 2002. Her work focuses on state, regional, and transboundary water resources management and policy, and places particular emphasis on how to achieve desired policy objectives in terms of institutional structures and possible changes to them. She writes a water policy column for the WRRC’s quarterly newsletter. Current projects include water planning and management in growing, arid regions and mechanisms to secure water for environmental needs. Dr. Megdal teaches the multi-disciplinary graduate course Arizona Water Policy. She serves as an elected member of the Central Arizona Water Conservation District Board of Directors, which oversees the Central Arizona Project. She also is a member of Arizona Governor’s Blue Ribbon Panel on Water Sustainability. Dr. Megdal has served on numerous state boards and commissions, including the Arizona Corporation Commission and the Arizona State Transportation Board. She is also director of the University of Arizona Water Sustainability Program. In 2008, she became the first recipient of the C.W. and Modene Neely Endowed Professorship for Excellence in Agriculture and Life Science.

Curriculum Vitae

Water Resources Research Center

Awards and Honors
C.W. and Modene Neely Endowed Professorship for Excellence in Agriculture and Life Science

Classes Taught
SWES 596B Arizona Water Policy

Selected Publications
“Arizona’s Groundwater Savings Recharge Program,” with Taylor Shipman, Southwest Hydrology, May-June 2008, forthcoming.

Evolution and Evaluation of the Active Management Area Management Plans, with Zachary Smith and Aaron Lien, Report submitted to the Arizona Water Institute and the Arizona Department of Water Resources, January 2008, posted, www.cals.arizona.edu/azwater and www.azwater.gov.

“Conserve to Enhance: Conserve Water to Enhance the Environment,” Arizona Water Resource, January-February 2008.

"Determinants of Environmental Noncompliance by Public Water Systems," Contemporary Economic Policy, with Tauhid Rahman, Satheesh Aradhyula, Mini Kohli and Jackie Moxley, forthcoming, 2008.

“Restoration and River Management in the Arid Southwestern U.S.: Exploring Project Design Trends and Features, with Andrea Gerlak, Susanna Eden, Kelly Mott Lacroix, and Andrew Schwarz, Water Policy, forthcoming, 2008.

“Conserve to Enhance: Voluntary Municipal Water Conservation to Support Environmental Restoration,” with Andrew Schwarz, Journal of the American Water Works Association, Volume 100, No. 1, January 2008, 42-53.

Water Conservation Banking: Municipal Water Conservation to Support Environmental Enhancement, with Andrew Schwarz, Report submitted to the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation, December 2007, posted, www.cals.arizona.edu/azwater/.

“Municipal Water Reuse in Tucson, Arizona,” in M. K. Zaidi, ed., Wastewater Reuse – Risk Assessment, Decision-Making and Environmental Security, Springer, AK/Nato Publishing Unit, 2007, 81-90.

“Good Intentions, Unintended Consequences: The Central Arizona Groundwater Replenishment District,” with Christopher Avery, Carla Consoli and Robert Glennon, Arizona Law Review, Vol 49, No. 2, 339-359, Summer 2007.

“Arizona’s Recharge and Recovery Programs,” in Bonnie G. Colby and Katharine L. Jacobs, ed. Arizona Water Policy: Management Innovations in an Urbanizing, Arid Region, RFF Press, 2007.

“The Importance of Water Storage and Recovery in Arizona,” Arizona Review, University of Arizona Department of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Vol. 3, Issue 1, Spring 2005.

“Water and the Environment: The Role of Ecosystem Restoration,” Report on the Annual Conference of the Arizona Water Resources Research Center, The Water Report, Issue 16, June 15, 2005, pp. 7-14.

“Water Management in the Active Management Areas,” “Water Supply and Management Beyond the Active Management Areas,” and “Questions of Water, Growth and Policy,” Co-authored Chapters 6,7 and 11, respectively, in Arizona’s Water Future: Challenges and Opportunities, Background Report prepared for the 85th Arizona Town Hall, October 2004.

“Managing to Avoid Crisis: A Look at Water Management Efforts in Rural Arizona,” with Jacqueline Moxley, Arizona Review, University of Arizona Department of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Fall 2003.

“The Benefits of State Regulation,” in American Regulatory Federalism and Telecommunications Infrastructure, edited by Paul Teske, Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Inc., 1995, pp. 85–94.

Megdal, Sharon B. “On Regulation, Deregulation, and Economics,” The Energy Journal 10, July 1989, 181–195.

Megdal, Sharon B. “The Flypaper Effect Revisited: An Econometric Explanation,” The Review of Economics and Statistics 69, May 1987, 347–351.