.
Colorado
Water Partnership Pitches Drought Plan
by
Judah Ken Freed
Colorado
Water Partnership pitches Front Range
solutions for the worsening shortages.
.
Amid
biting wind-chill in Ruby Hill Park last
week, members of the Colorado Water
Partnership last week pitched their plea
for the legislature to back water projects
for the growing Front Range communities.
The environmental and western slope
interests contacted after the event were
not enthusiastic.
At a Dec. 19 press
conference on the dry grass off Osage
Street in the southwestern Denver park
overlooking the South Platte River, a
handful of print and electronic reporters
were told that the partnership of Front
range municipalities and water districts
supports "twelve equity principles on
Colorado Water policy."
The press release
passed out at the event urged the state
legislature to set the construction and
improvement of new and existing water
storage and delivery projects "as
essential elements of state water policy
for future generations."
Arapahoe County
Commissioner and CWP chair Marie MacKenzie
offered three action items for the
legislature in the session beginning in
January 2003.
First, support the
$10 billion referendum by Sen. Jim Dyer,
R-SD26, for bond financing of new water
storage projects plus improvements to
existing dams and water utility delivery
systems.
Second, identify
water projects that can be put online
quickly to collect a minimum of 300,000
acre feet of water.
Third, provide new
water supplies to the state's agricultural
businesses.
MacKenzie said
Colorado water users need strong action
now, not another decade of debate without
getting anything accomplished. CWP is
willing to work with such water interests
as Club 20 and the Group of 58 to find
solutions. She stressed that the
Partnership is not backing any specific
water projects, so could not name any
potential sites to store more
water.
Parker Water and
Sanitation District manager Frank Jaeger
said the state needs a "quid pro quo" that
balances the interests of both eastern and
western slope water users.
He compared the 21st
Century fight between forces on each side
of the Continental Divide to the battle
between North and South in America's 19th
Century Civil War.
He voiced concern
about the depletion of ground water
resources in the Denver Aquifer, which
makes it necessary to find "equitable
solutions" for moving water from one basin
to another. To illustrate his point, he
cited wells in Douglas County a mile apart
that seem to be interfering with one
another, asserting the well-head pressure
is down 40 percent from a year
ago.
Of chief concern to
CWP is a million acre feet of water in the
Colorado River that's currently flowing
out of state despite compacts that allow
Colorado to retain that water, if it
could.
Jefferson County
Commission Pat Holloway praised steps
taken in December by U.S Interior
Secretary Gale Norton to halt the use by
California of water that duly belongs in
Colorado. Five western state governors
recently lobbied Norton about California's
need to "honor its commitment to reduce
its use of Colorado River water," she
said.
Another perspective
came from South Metro Chamber president
Brian Vogt, chair of the business
coalition within CWP. "We need a
public-private partnership among cities,
agriculture and industry for sustainable
water development in Colorado.
"Without a water
policy that includes both finance and
planning," he added, "we might not attract
new businesses to relocate here. We might
not be able to balance our quality of life
in Colorado with the creation of good
jobs."
Contacted by phone
Sen. Dyer said he's planning to introduce
in the 2003 session a bill substantially
like the measure he offered in the special
session last July. A key difference will
be an emphasis on revenue anticipation
bonds rather than general revenue bonds,
so water projects will pay for
themselves.
"We want to put a
bill on the table that's fair to both
sides of the Continental Divide," he said.
"The idea is not to raise $10 billion and
then find projects to spend it on. Rather,
I want the state Water Conservation Board
set broad priorities, and then I want to
create an income stream for potential
projects through the bonding
authority."
Storage solutions
will "not be limited big dams and
reservoirs," he said. "This is not a dam
bill, but I guess that depends on who you
ask. My idea is to back anything that
helps, including conservation."
Dyer emphasized that
he does not have any particular projects
or dam locations in mind. "There is no
hidden agenda here. My only goals are to
create a funding mechanism for improving
the storage and transport system we have
now, and then to create more storage
capacity for the future in a way that's
fair to everyone."
His water project
funding bill again will be a voter
referendum instead of statutory
legislation for the governor to sign, he
said. "With a million new residents each
year, the people of Colorado have to
express their opinion about how we solve
the problems from both the drought and
growth in Colorado."
Dyer said he
anticipates his strongest opposition in
the Senate will come from Sen. Ken
Chlouber, R-SD4. In the House, he expects
opposition from Rep. Carl Miller, D-HD61.
Both led efforts to kill the referendum
during the special session.
Ken Chlouber offered
an assessment of Dyer's revived bill and
its backing from the Colorado Water
Partnership. "If you boil it all down to
country Colorado common sense language,
looks like Butch Cassidy and the Sundance
Kid on the Front Range are after as much
western slope water as they can
get."
He disputed claims
the Denver Aquifer is going dry. "With 100
million acre feet of water, that's more
ground water than in all of Lake Powell."
He said the Front Range cities should tap
this water first before asking for any
more concessions from rural Colorado.
"Jim' heart is in
the right place, but we have to do a lot
more talking about where that $10 billion
would go before I can sign on. I'm not
about to support a bill that lets the
Front Range keep their Kentucky bluegrass
lawns at our expense."
He added that the
biggest struggle facing any water projects
proposal in Colorado is NIMBY &endash; Not
In My Back Yard.
Nevertheless,
Chlouber said he's promised Dyer to work
with him on the proposal during the
regular session. "There just was not
enough time to properly consider his water
plan during the special session, so I
followed the old rule, when in doubt, vote
no."
Carl Miller said he
opposed Dyer's bill in the special
session, "and I'm confident that I'll
oppose it in the regular session if it's
essential the same blank check as before."
The water producing counties in the
Rockies cannot afford to subsidize the
water consumer counties on the Front
Range.
"You always have to
remember what Governor Love said all those
years ago, that water flows uphill toward
money," said Miller. "My fear is that the
metro Denver counties are going to come up
here to leave us high and dry."
Miller asserted that
Dyer's funding bill is superfluous. "We
already have plenty of bonding mechanisms
in place. We just need to use these for
new projects, such as developing the
Denver Aquifer, which is the largest body
of water in Colorado."
With about 90 bills
related to water expected in the coming
session, Miller said he waiting to see all
the options before he makes and
declarations. He supports the efforts of
Gale Norton to keep more of the Colorado
River water in Colorado. He also supports
more water conservation and upgrading the
existing storage
infrastructure.
"The problems
ultimately are statewide," he said, "and
solutions are going to take genuine
cooperation between the Front Range and
rural Colorado.
Among the
alternatives to Dyer's bill will be a
proposal from Sen. Doug Linkhart, D-SD31,
requiring cities to show they have taken
effective step to conserve water before
they can build new storage facilities.
"There's a rush to
build more dams," he said, "but I want to
make sure we take full advantage of
conservation and other options first. We
are not yet doing what we could to save
water. We risk cities drying up and
blowing away. Or rather, we risk our
cities becoming as parched as those in the
southwestern desert."
Among the options
Linkhart supports is dry year leasing. A
farmer lets the land rest in a drought
year while selling the unused water
rights, earning about the same as for a
fair crop that year.
"We're still talking
with water providers, western slope
players, agricultural interests, and Front
Range municipalities about the final
language in the bill," he said. Supporting
the proposal is a coalition that includes
the Sierra Club, led by Colorado Open
Lands.
"There is nothing
radical in the bill," Linkhart added,
"just the common sense idea of saving
money by saving water before we build any
costly new storage facilities."
Long-term thinking
is needed, said Elise Jones, executive
director of the Colorado Environmental
Coalition. Competing interests need to
find a balance that creates a sustainable
future here.
"Behind all the
reasonable and nice-sounding words of
groups like the Colorado Water
Partnership," she said, "their agenda
seems to be more and more dams, as if that
was our only option. Instead of Colorado
spending billions on costly and
ecologically destructive projects, we need
to invest in cheaper, faster and smart
alternatives."
Given than 90
percent of the water used in Colorado goes
for agriculture, she said, why not change
irrigation practices? Instead of flooding
fields and sprinkler systems with
tremendous evaporation loss, for example,
use "drip irrigation" from hoses with
holes in them, so water soaks directly
into the ground beside the growing
plants.
Instead of building
more dams and reservoirs where the water
evaporates without benefit to anyone, or
instead of massive water diversion
projects, invest in constructing more
underground storage systems, or simply
pump more water back into the aquifers.
"That way there is no environmental damage
at all."
"If Colorado is
going to continue to grow in population,"
Jones said," to ensure enough fresh water,
we need to think in fresh ways. It can be
done, but only if we have the political
will."
Orginally
written for The Colorado
Statesman.
December 2002
(c) 2002-03 by Judah Ken Freed
|
