PUB00155

• Year: 2007
• Title: The Colorado River The Story of a Quest for Certainty on a Diminishing River
• CWCB Section: Administration
• Author: Eric Kuhn
• Description: The Colorado River The Story of a Quest for Certainty on a Diminishing River
• Publications - Doc Type: Other

and future needs" and "A compact would prevent a free-for-all race to see who could develop the
fastest because it would assure its rights were permanently protected."96

Construction on the fust features of the C-BT Project would begin in the late 1930s. Work
on the Continental Divide tunnel began on June 23, 1940. Although the project would not be
completed until 1957, the first water was diverted through the Adams Tunnel to the Platte River
Basin on June 23, 1947.

The C-BT Project now diverts an average of about 230,000 af per year from the headwaters
of the Colorado River into the Platte River Basin.

House Document 419. "The Colorado River." Eightieth Congress. First Session

In July 1947, then Secretary of the Interior J .A. Krug and then Commissioner of the Bureau
of Reclamation Michael W. Strauss, submitted the "Interim Report on the Status of the
Investigations Authorized To Be Made by the Boulder Canyon Project Act and the Boulder Canyon
Project Adjustment Act" to Congress. House Document 419 (HD 419) would become the blueprint
for the future development of the Colorado River as well as the genesis of the Upper Colorado River
Basin Compact in 1948 and the Arizona v. California Supreme Court decision in 1963 and its decree
in 1964. The letter of transmittal of HD 419 to Congress included specific conclusions and
recommendations, which prior to submission, were endorsed by President Truman.

CONCLUSIONS

"My conclusions are:

(1) That a comprehensive plan of development for the Colorado Basin
cannot be formulated at this time;

(2) That further development of the water resources of the Colorado
River Basin, particularly large-scale development, is seriously
handicapped, if not barred, by lack of a determination of the rights of
the individual States to utilize the waters of the Colorado River
system. The water supplies for projects to accomplish such
development might be assured as a result of compact among the
States of the separate basins, appropriate court or congressional
action, or otherwise;

(3) That the States of the upper Colorado River Basin and States of
the lower Colorado River Basin should be encouraged to proceed
expeditiously to determine their respective rights to the waters of the
Colorado River consistent with the Colorado River compact;

96 Make no mistake, Carpenter was a strong supporter and advocate of trans mountain diversions, Tyler, pages 247-250.

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