8B

• Board Meeting Date: 1/22/2008
• Description: CWCB Legislative Priorities and Recommendations - Funding for Instream Flow Acquisitions
• Board Meetings - Doc Type: Memo

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DENVER GRAND JUNCTION CRAIG
536 Wynkoop Ilreel, 5( 546 Main Ilreel, #402 11 W. Viclary Way, #208
Denver, (0 80202 Grand Junction, CO 81501 (raig, (0 81625
303.534.7066 970.243.0002 970.824.5241
.
January 18, 2008
COLORADO
Colorado Water Conservation Board
ENVIRONMENTAL 1313 Sherman Street, Room 721
COALITION Denver, Colorado 80203
(olo,a4/J's Wll(e fOl Re: Le,rislation Strengthening Colorado's Instream Flow Program
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Dear Board Members,
The undersigned organizations urge the Colorado Water Conservation Board ("CWCB")
to support two peces of legislation that would strengthen Colorado's instream flow
program. We appreciate the effort by CWCB staff since the November meeting to address
the concerns board members expressed with the legislation. We support the changes to the
legislation that CWCB staff will present at the January meeting.
Flowing water is critical to Colorado's renowned environment, sustaining fish, wildlife
and healthy riparian corridors, as well as Colorado's burgeoning outdoor recreation and
tourism economies. Low stream flow, however, is a serious problem in semi-arid
Colorado. As Colorado's population continues to skyrocket, more and more water is
diverted out of rivers and streams to satisfy human demands, and today many of
. Colorado's waterways lack adequate flow to sustain healthy fisheries and riparian habitats.
The wanning and drying climate that many scientists predict for Colorado will only
exacerbate the pressures on aquatic environments.
The CWCB's instream flow program is an invaluable tool for protecting and restoring
flows in Colorado's rivers and streams. The CWCB can obtain instream flow water rights
either by making a new, junior appropriation of water or by leasing, purchasing or
receiving a donation of water from a willing water right holder. The CWCB makes
frequent use of its authority to appropriate junior
instream flow water rights, but junior rights will not protect the ecological value of streams
where senior rights divert much or all of a river's water. On such heavily used streams, the
CWCB's authority to enter into voluntary transactions to acquire existing water rights is
the best tool for protecting or restoring the environment. Unfortunately, the CWCB has
made infrequent use of its water rights acquisition authority.
One of the reasons for the underutilization of the CWCB' s water rights acquisition
program is that, as a result of a quirk in existing law, a party making a long-term loan or
lease of water to the CWCB risks losing the consumptive use credit associated with the
water right. In effect, a loss of consumptive use credit would undermine the water right
holder's ability to sell or lease the water right after the expiration of the agreement with the
CWCB. Similarly, a long-term loan or lease
of water to the CWCB creates a risk that the water right could be deemed abandoned
altogether. Faced with these risks, it is not surprising that few water rights holders have
loaned or leased water to the CWCB's instream flow program.
Another reason that the CWCB has not made greater use of its water rights acquisition
. authority is that the program has not been adequately funded. While the CWCB has made
loans and grants of hundreds of millions of dollars over the years to aid in the development
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