Rio Verde Foothills is an unincorporated rural community in the wilds of Maricopa County, Arizona. As you may know, Arizona is largely desert, and deserts are well-known for lacking abundant water.

Arizona law requires homebuilders in active management areas to secure a reliable source of water expected to last at least a hundred years. However, there’s a loophole: the law only applies to subdivisions of six homes or more. You can guess what some clever developers do: they simply build lots of “subdivisions” each consisting of only five homes.

These so-called “wildcat” communities are all over the state. They’re miniature havens of freedom, perfect for stubbornly independent libertarians who want to get out from under the thumb of government bureaucrats telling them where they can and can’t live. Rio Verde Foothills is one such.

But then they made an awful discovery. It turns out, even when you find a way to skirt regulations about water… humans still need water .