BERTHOUD – The Colorado Water Conservation Board on Wednesday sent to Gov. John Hickenlooper a draft water plan that aims to shape the future of the precious resource in Colorado.
The board met at the Northern Colorado Water Conservancy District in Berthoud.
After hearing an overview of the comprehensive plan that took a year-and-a-half to craft, the board voted unanimously to send it to the governor, sparking applause from an attentive audience. One board staff member cried upon its passage, highlighting the long, tedious journey of the plan.
Hickenlooper ordered the plan in May 2013; a final plan must be completed by Dec. 10, 2015.
Board members are careful to point out that the roadmap is a “living document” that can be changed over the years.
“We will take the direction that (the governor) has given ... to you all and make sure we are all on the same page and moving forward together onward into 2015,” said James Eklund, director of the Colorado Water Conservation Board.
The municipal water supply gap is growing in Colorado, with shortfalls expected by 2050. The result could be agricultural dry-up and fish and wildlife extinction, not to mention increased demands and pressure on municipalities.
The Water Plan aims to provide a roadmap for the future while protecting private ownership of water rights. Colorado uses a so-called “prior appropriation” system. In this system, rights are granted to the first person to take water from a river or aquifer, despite residential proximity.
But the plan must navigate a maze of state, local and federal laws, as well as balance the needs of agricultural-heavy rural Colorado with the rapidly expanding urban-centered Front Range.
There has long been resistance from rural Colorado to transmountain water diversions for Front Range communities. Some municipalities end up purchasing water rights from farmers when there is no diversion, leaving ag land dry.
“We have no more water to give,” Mike Samson, a Garfield County commissioner, told the board during public testimony.
The Water Plan task is monumental. It will end in the first such comprehensive plan for Colorado.
“This is an unprecedented effort,” said April Montgomery, a member of the Water Conservation Board representing the San Miguel, Dolores, Animas and San Juan rivers in Southwest Colorado. “This is the first time we’ve had a grass-roots basin implementation plan.”
Included in the water plan are proposals from eight separate water basins, including a roadmap provided by the Southwest Basin Roundtable.
The basin is more complicated than other basins in the state, flowing through two Native American reservations, the Ute Mountain Ute Reservation and the Southern Ute Indian Reservation. Also the basin includes a series of nine sub-basins, eight of which flow out of state.
Other complications include agreements with the federal government, which owns large swaths of land in the region.
Montgomery said the Water Plan offers Southwest Colorado an opportunity to come together and develop a unified plan moving forward.
The goals of the Southwest include pursuing projects that meet the municipal water gap; providing safe drinking water; prioritizing conservation; and promoting water reuse strategies.
“It’s not a mandate,” Montgomery said. “It just gives us direction.”
Russ George, a member of the water board representing the Colorado River Mainstem, said many thought drafting a plan would be impossible.
“It’s been just an absolutely impossible task, but typical of this outfit, ... we did it anyhow,” George said. “There’s no magic here, no promise around the corner, it’s all choice.”