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Section 4 Delineating and Prioritizing Colorado's Environmental and Recreational Resources and Needs Environmental and recreational uses of water are expected to increase with population growth. These uses help support Colorado's tourism industry, provide recreational and environmental benefits to our citizens, and are an important industry in many parts of the state. Without a mechanism to fund environmental and recreational enhancement beyond project mitigation measures required by law, conflicts among municipal and industrial, agricultural, recreational, and environmental users could intensify. The initial SWSI Report identified important information regarding environmental and recreational resources and methodologies used to delineate and quantify needs. However, the CWCB and many involved in the SWSI process felt that additional work was needed to further prioritize and quantify our environmental and recreational needs. CWCB, recognizing the importance of furthering the understanding of environmental and recreational values of Colorado's water resources, established the Environment and Recreation TRT (formally the Prioritize and Quantify Environment and Recreation Needs TRT). The Environment and Recreation TRT developed a broad mission statement (Section 4.2.1) and a series of questions (Section 4.2.2) to further our understanding of environmental and recreational needs statewide. Subcommittees were then formed to address the series of questions. The subcommittees and full Environment and Recreation TRT worked diligently to address its key questions and mission statement. During this process, the members recognized the enormity of the challenges associated with describing and addressing Colorado's environmental and recreational water needs. The TRT made significant strides in identifying statewide environmental and recreational resources, which are referred to as "attributes" in this report. These resources or attributes have been delineated and summarized in geographic information system (GIS) coverages and are included in this report and are available as a DVD in Appendix D. The TRT did not make as much progress as it bad hoped in prioritizing and quantifying environmental and recreational needs associated with the identified attributes. The results of the Environment and Recreation TRT should be considered in this context. Biological systems and recreational values are complex and dynamic and will likely change over time. In addition, the geographic scope of the effort and emerging scientific views and social and economic factors further complicate the task of prioritizing and quantifying our environmental and recreational needs. The recommendations and conclusions of the section will further explain that this TRT's efforts are one step in a continuing process to address environmental and recreational needs statewide. The remainder of this section of the report describes the activities and outcomes of the Environment and Recreation TRT. Detail on specific TRT efforts can be found in the following subsections: ~ Section 4.2 Environment and Recreation Roundtable describes the mission and objectives of the TRT, the questions the TRT focused on, and the subcommittees formed to address the questions. ~ Section 43 Technical Subcommittee describes the products that were developed by the technical subcommittee. ~ Section 4.4 Financial Subcommittee describes the products that were developed by the financial subcommittee. ~ Section 4.5 Legal/Water Rights/ Institutional/ Political Subcommittee describes the products that were developed by the legal/water rights/ institutional/political subcommittee. 4-2 FINAL DRAFT The 2004 SWSI Report identified the importance of environmental and recreational needs in two of the study's key findings: