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Little more than two months ago, on an unusually rainy November evening, the Queen Creek Town Council staked claim to the city’s future.

Queen Creek, located in central Arizona southeast of Phoenix, was founded in 1989 but is already home to some 88,000 people. In a unanimous vote, the council approved a $244 million deal to acquire 12,000 acre-feet of water annually for the next century from the Harquahala groundwater basin, some 90 miles away. (An acre-foot is enough water for about three households per year.)

Much of the discourse on how to handle the Colorado River’s viability as the West’s biggest water source is focused on water conservation measures. In reality, those sorts of interventions might be missing the forest for the trees.

Vox’s Kenny Torrella reported on the Colorado River Compact’s struggles to reach a deal for the next two decades. The seven states in the compact — California, Arizona, Colorado, Utah, Nevada, New Mexico, and Wyoming — missed a Feb. 14 deadline to seal a new agreement amid a snow drought that is adding even more tension.

Ever since California was pummeled by a series of storms in fall and early winter, experts have said the state’s water supply is looking strong for this year.

Those storms — with a potential bump from the ones hitting much of the state this week — have helped refill reservoirs and eased immediate drought worries in many parts of the state.