WSP08754

• File Number: 8210.110.60
• Description: Colorado River Water Users Association
• Basin: Colorado Mainstem
• Date: 12/12/1968
• Author: CRWUA
• Title: Proceedings of the 25th Annual Conference
• Water Supply Pro - Doc Type: Annual Report

1

THE RIVER AND THE PEOPLE

By A. B. WEST, Regional Director, Region 3
U. S. Bureau of Reclamation, Boulder City, Nevada

I am pleased to be here with the members and friends of the Colorado River Water Users
Association on the occasion of its Silver Anniversary. As you are all aware, Region 3 of the Bureau of
Reclamation has been the Federal office most deeply involved in the development of the resources of
the lower Colorado River. It has been our goal to achieve a balanced river management program that
recognizes and serves the overall needs of the people who depend so much on the river. Since you in
the audience represent those people, or are very closely associated with them, I am particularly pleased
to have this opportunity to tell you how our work is progressing.

The early period of river management in the decade of the Thirties was devoted to planning
and building of dams. Now, our river management activities consist of two principal phases, The first
is to control the water flowing in the river. This is accomplished through an increasingly scientific
coordination of supply and demand. This coordination has reached a new high level of efficiency in re-
cent years. Senator Wash Reservoir and pumping plant, near Imperial Dam, has been a major contribu-
tor. It permits water users to order water more realistically and lets us schedule riverflows much more
closely without fear of causing shortages in deliveries. It also makes it possible for us to place in stor-
age a portion of the excess flows resulting from storm runoff and reduced water requirements during
and following storm periods. The records show that the unscheduled excess deliveries to Mexico have
been reduced appreciably during the past 3 years. In 1963, 1964, and 1965, they ranged from 119,000
to 332,000 acre-feet per year. In 1966, 1967, and 1968, they ranged from a high of 44,000 acre-feet in
1966 to a low of 20,000 acre-feet this year.

The second principal phase of our river management activities is the control and stabilization
of the river channel, which affects your future supply of water and your present daily operations.

Reclamation's multiple-purpose river management program began near Needles in 1946. That
work in the Mohave Valley Division was an emergency response to a condition of chronic flooding, As
the work got underway the value of water salvage was recognized and was adopted as a project goal.
Wildlife and recreation values were considered in this work, but the measures which were included in ,
the original project for fish, wildlife, and recreation were only a beginning when compared to Recla-
mation's current work.

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At the present time, Reclamation has spent $8,200,000 in the Mohave Valley Division. Of
this amount, $827,000, or about 10 percent, was for wildlife and recreation features. Water salvage in
the Division amounted to 109,000 acre-feet per year. Of this, about 65,000 acre-feet have been sal-
vaged. The remaining 44,000 acre-feet are contingent on future maintenance which we had planned to
carry out in the Topock Gorge. Additive to this is the potential salvage of 28,000 acre-feet by work in
the Topock Gorge Division, Our Palo Verde Division river management work extends from the Palo
Verde Diversion Dam to Taylor Ferry south of Blythe, California. The work in this Division is virtu-
ally, complete. It consisted of stabilizing the river channel by narrowing wide reaches of the river with
gravel and rock training structures and by armoring, eroding sections of the natural riverbank with
quarried rock, Many backwater areas were created by this work, and in cooperation with the Arizona
Game and Fish Department, the California Department of Fish and Game, and the Bureau of Sport
Fisheries and Wildlif~, we are striving to provide facilities which will make the most of the fish and
wildlife resources of the Division. We have installed 17 pipe structures to insure fresh waterflow in the
backwaters as provided in the original project plan. Cooperative efforts to deepen these backwaters to
provide benefits beyond those called for by the project plan have been slowed by our budget prob-
lems this year. We hope soon to reactivate this work,

Our completed work in the Palo Verde Division has cost $2,900,000 with $134,000 or about 5
percent of this for recreation and wildlife features. Water salvaged was 10,000 acre-feet per year. The
work also reduces the sediment inflow into the Imperial Division by 310,000 tons per year.

The Cibola Division is just downstream from the Palo Verde Division and extends to the lower

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