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,I Attorney Sam Maynes says the 5lerra aub is violating the SOlJt:h3rn Ute tribe's dvil rights. 22 - C 1996 Hlltl COO1try News 1993 could leave the tribes with a lot of expensive water sitting in a reservoir miles from where it's needed, with no way to move it and no legal authority to lease it downstream. ''Why is it called an Indian project if it does not help the Southern Utes?" asks Frost. Maynes, the Anglo water districts and Ben Campbell hoodwinked Congress, says Frost bitterly, while at home Leonard Burch "sold us a bill of goods." Perhaps because of Frost's campaign, a record number of tribal members showed at the Bureau of Reclamation hearings in Durango last December to protest the project. Many said they want Congress and the non-Indian community to know that not all members support the idea. "It's not an Indian projec~" says Dedra Militch, a young reporter for the Southern Ute Drum and one of several Southern Utes who have joined the Four Comers Action Coalition. "Our lawyers are really playing on this guilt trip so non-Indians feel like if they oppose the project they are doing hann to the Indians." Militch and' others compare Animas-La Plata to the Navajo Project, the Dolores Project and the CenlIfl! Utah Project - three Bureau of Reclamation dams sold to Congress in part because they brought water to Indian reserva- tions. But in all three cases, the portions of the projects that served the reservations were either dropped or only partially built. Other people on the reservation, includ- ing many elders, say they would have opposed A-LP before but never understood it because the tribal radio station and newspaper are censored. Others question why Leonard Burch refused to hold public hearings on the water settlement back in 1988, or let tribal members vote on the treaty. "The Sierra Club is doing everybody jus- tice," says, Ray Frost. "The only thing is, the Sierra Club needs to come talk to the people of the Southern Ute reservation instead of just speaking to our elected officials and laywers, They need to talk to the people." Delays The next round in the war over A-LP is likely to take place in Washington, D.C. The Four Comers Action Coalition recently sent a delegation to the Qinton administration, ask- ing them to block funding for A-LP in 1994, and instead to help negotiate an alternative. At lhe same time, Campbell says he and the File photolDurango Herald Southern Ute Tribal Chainnan Leonard Burch rest of the Colorado delegation will push to see that A-LP stays on track. Meanwhile, Roland Robinson, head of BuRee's Upper Colorado Region, says he ordered the Durango field office to put every~ thing on hold until the administration can review the project. But with few appointees in place, he doesn't expect an answer from Clinton or Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt for several months. Robinson says that if a decision is made to continue, there are so many problems it may take BuRee a year or more to produce a final EIS -and that's without any lawsuits. Delays work for opponents. Every year rais- es the cost by $40 mi Ilion and hrings it one step closer to the Jan. 1, 2000, deadline, In addition, Sam Maynes is said to be ill. Should that force him to retire, or even to significantly slacken his pace, no one knows who would be able to replace him at the head of the coalition. On the other hand, the federal government can't allow the impa....se to stand or the project simply to die. Dozens of Native American tribes in the West have agreed to negotiate their water rights, based in part on the apparently successful A-LP settlement. Unless the federal government and Western states want to be deluged by water lit- igation, Clinton and Babbitt must either commit to Animas-La Plata, or find a better alternative, . Steve Hinchman is staff reporter for the High COll!ltiY News.