WSP08807

• File Number: 8220.106
• Description: Animas-La Plata
• State: CO
• Basin: San Juan/Dolores
• Water Division: 7
• Date: 10/26/1990
• Author: Judith Jacobsen
• Title: The Navajo Indian Irrigation Project and Quantification of Navajo Winters Rights
• Water Supply Pro - Doc Type: Report/Study

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Whether Navajo claims to the San Juan River in New Mexico were quantified with

the passage of NIIP's authorizing legislation is an important question. With 165,000

members and a reservation of 15 million acres, the Navajo Tribe has one of the

largest potential Winters claims in the West.25 Also, the issue is not an academic one.

In February of 1988, the Interior Department's Inspector General recol11Il1ended in an

audit of NIIP that the project be "terminated" before reaching the full 110,630 acres.

Admitting that the Navajo would be deprived of promised water if its advice were

followed, the IG suggested "reasonable compensation" to the Tribe for alllosses.26 In

response to the audit, the Interior Department set in motion plans for deciding a

"termination point of the project" in the future.27 If work on the project is stopped

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before it reaches 110,630 acres, it is not possible to calculate the tribe's "losses"

without knowing whether its Winters rights to the San Juan were limited to NIIP or

whether it has viable claims to the San Juan in New Mexico beyond NIIP. Navajo

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water rights are also involved in a general stream adjudication on the San Juan filed

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by the New Mexico State Engineer in 1975. At issue in the case are Indian claims (of

the Navajo, the Jicarilla Apache, and Ute Mountain Ute), water for other federal

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25For Navajo population and the Navajo Reservation's area, ~ Getches and
Wilkinson, ~ note 3 at 4 and 6. For the size of Navajo Winters claims, & Back
and Taylor, ~ note 15 at 71.

26Memorandum to the Assistant Secretary for Indian Affairs from the Assistant
Inspector General for Audits, Subject: "Final Audit Repon, 'Navajo Indian Irrigation
Project, Bureau of Indian Affairs,' (C-IA-BIA-10-87) (Repon No. 88-43)," Feb. 5, 1988.

27Memorandum to the Assistant Inspector General for Audits from the Acting
Assistant Secretary-Indian Affairs, Subject: "Bureau of Indian Affairs Response to Final
Audit Repon, "Navajo Indian Irrigation Project, Bureau of Indian Affairs: (C-IA-BIA-
10-87; Repon No. 88-43)," Apr. 29, 1988.