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<br />by spring, They would support legislation that would establish a cutoff date for <br />post-pumping depletions that occurred prior to 1974, and emphasized that this is <br />about the depletions that happened now from pumping that has occurred before <br />1974, not grandfather in wells, Stated that shortage in Bijou Reservoir in 2002 <br />could have been covered if upstream well depletions had been replaced, He <br />commented about the Water Court process and stated that 95 percent of the <br />cases that were filed were filed informally without going to the judge, the vast <br />majority of all cases filed in the Water Court get resolved quickly and not very <br />expensively; only 1 % of all cases went to trial. <br /> <br />Emily Hunt - Water Resources Administrator for the City of Thornton <br />They have acquired enough water rights to serve the current population of <br />Thornton; all their acquisitions were purchased based on the prior appropriation <br />system; if rules change and there isn't water in the river that should be there, <br />they will need to go acquire water which is very expensive; they have a history of <br />working well with farmers. The best solutions are worked out of compromise, <br />Solutions: collectively get users to buy insurance policies; storage; <br />infrastructures to help move water, <br /> <br />Don Fritzler - Lower South Platte Water Conservancy District <br />Has a farm in northeastern Colorado, he owns wells, has an augmentation <br />plan and does not injure senior water rights below him, He is not willing to take <br />water that does not belong to him and expects the same to be done to him; he <br />owns surface rights and storage rights, Changing the priority system is taking <br />water from those who own it and giving it to those who don't, it's taking property <br />rights, He asked the Task Force to not change the priority system. <br /> <br />Larry Dirks - Water Resources Engineer for Denver Water (handout attached <br />at the end of this document) <br />Denver Water began importing water to the South Platte Basin in 1936, it <br />imported water through the Moffat Tunnel which was diverted in the Frazier <br />collection system, In the 1960's, they added on the Blue River collection system, <br />Dillon Reservoir and Roberts Tunnel which imported more water to the South <br />Platte basin, They first began reusing water from effluent plants in the 1970's; the <br />remainder of Denver's effluent stayed in the river and supported the river and <br />masked the effects of the pumping that occurred downstream, They developed a <br />recycling plant which allows recycling from the effluent stream of Metro sewer <br />about 10,000 acre-feet of water per year, At full completion of the plan, Denver <br />Water will be able to recycle 17,000 acre-feet per year, Denver Water also <br />initiated a study to look at the reusable return flows from lawn irrigation <br />throughout their surface area of 235 square miles, As more water is reused, the <br />river will change below Denver, there will be less water available and the call will <br />be more senior, He stated that the priority system should be maintained, <br /> <br />- 3 - <br />