A trio of authorities on Western water issues will gather at Stanford in November for a symposium that will examine whether legal precedents dating from the 19th century are appropriate for solving 21st century problems.

The symposium will be presented in conjunction with the presentation of the first James V. Risser Prize for Western Environmental Journalism. Todd Hartman, Ken Papaleo and Jerd Smith, of the Rocky Mountain News, won the prize for their series, "The Last Drop," which detailed the degree to which the rivers of Colorado's Rocky Mountains face ominous threats from the thirst of urban development.

The symposium will be held at 3:30 p.m. Tuesday, Nov. 1, in the Social Sciences Research Center Reading Room of the Bing Wing of Green Library. It is open to the public, and a reception will follow.

The prize is named for Risser, a two-time Pulitzer Prize winner and director emeritus of the Knight Fellowships program. It is sponsored by the John S. Knight Fellowships for Professional Journalists and the Bill Lane Center for the Study of the North American West at Stanford.

Risser will be present at the symposium and will present the award to Smith, who will represent the Rocky Mountain News team on the panel.

The symposium, "Water in the West: 21st Century Challenges in a 19th Century Legal Framework," will also feature Prof. Barton H. "Buzz" Thompson, of Stanford Law School, and Thomas J. Graff, California regional director of the organization Environmental Defense (formerly the Environmental Defense Fund).

Smith holds a political science degree from the University of Evansville and a master's degree in journalism from Northwestern University. She currently covers water, drought and growth issues for the Rocky Mountain News, where she has worked since 1997. The other two members of the winning team are reporter Todd Hartman and photographer Ken Papaleo.

The judges said that the winning Rocky Mountain News entry cast new light on an important subject: the battle over water, and Risser said, "Water is the enduring environmental problem of the West, and this Rocky Mountain News series does a magnificent job of exploring the threat of dwindling water supply in Colorado's mountain regions."

Thompson is the Robert E. Paradise Professor of Natural Resources Law and a director of the Stanford Institute for the Environment. A graduate of Stanford Law School, he was in private practice with the firm of O'Melveny and Myers for eight years before joining the Stanford faculty in 1986.

Graff, a graduate of the Harvard Law School and the London School of Economics, founded Environmental Defense's California office in 1971. He helps guide all programs and departments in California and heads the organization's water resources sub-program in the state.

The Risser Prize was established earlier this year and is open to print, broadcast and online journalists writing about environmental issues in western Canada, Mexico and the United States.

The prize was established in recognition of Risser's outstanding journalism career and his leadership of the John S. Knight Fellowships for Professional Journalists from 1985 until his retirement in 2000.

The Knight Fellowships program annually brings 12 outstanding mid-career U.S. journalists and as many as eight from other countries to study at Stanford in a one-year program. More than 700 journalists have studied at Stanford under the program since it began in 1966. James Bettinger is director of the program. Dawn E. Garcia is deputy director.

The Center for the Study of the North American West was established at Stanford in 2002. Earlier this year it was endowed by L. W. "Bill" Lane Jr., Stanford, '42. An interdisciplinary center dedicated to enriching Western scholarship, it brings together scholars, policymakers, journalists and civic leaders for new conversations about the past, present and future of Western places - from Canada to Mexico, from the Great Plains to the Pacific Rim. Stanford history Professors David M. Kennedy and Richard White are directors of the program, and Margaret Pugh O'Mara, acting assistant professor of history, is deputy director.