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Currently, releases from Crystal are set at 700 cfs. The river flows below the tunnel are about 300 cfs. Due to the severity of the continuing drought in the Gunnison River Basin, river flows through the Black Canyon of the Gunnison have been set close to the minimum flow rate of 300 cfs since the close of late season's (2003) irrigation. It is anticipated that canyon flows will start to increase as downstream demands pick up, which should start to increase sometime during the first part of May. The next meeting ofthe "Aspinall Unit Working Group" will be held on Thursday, April 22, 2004 at 1 :00 PM in Grand Junction, Colorado. At this meeting, review oflast autumn and winter reservoir operations, and plans for next spring and summer 2004 operations will be discussed. These meetings are open forum discussions on the Aspinall Unit reservoir operations with many interested groups participating. Anyone needing further information about these meetings should contact Dan Crabtree in the Grand Junction Area Office at (970) 248-0652. Navajo - Reclamation increased the release from Navajo Reservoir from 250 cubic feet per second (cfs) to 350 cfs on Thursday, April 1, 2004, at 4:00 am. Releases are made for the authorized purposes of the Navajo Unit, and to attempt to maintain a target base flow through the endangered fish critical habitat reach of the San Juan River (Farmington to Lake Powell). Once again this year, a shortage sharing agreement on the San Juan River has been developed by water users. The agreement calls for users to limit their water use and share in shortages in the event a water shortage is realized. Minimum Target Base Flows for recovery of endangered fish will be 400 cfs through October based on the 2004 Shortage Sharing Agreement recommendations that target base flows be reduced from 500 cfs to 400 cfs for the April through October period, ifthe Minimum Probable forecast projects the July End-of-Month Content to be below 1,000,000 acre-feet. Based on the 2004 Shortage Sharing rules, a shortage does not exist under the April forecast. Because of gate repair work at Navajo Dam this spring, a spring peak release will not be made for endangered fish this year. The minimum allowable reservoir release will be 350 cfs through October, unless the Record of Decision (ROD) for the Navajo Reservoir EIS is signed before that time. Unregulated reservoir inflow for March was 119,000 acre-feet, or 133 percent of average. This unexpected above normal inflow was a direct result of much warmer temperatures than usual during March, thus initiating an early start to the annual spring runoff. The current daily reservoir inflow is averaging about 2,000 cfs. Presently, the reservoir water surface elevation is 6010.8 feet, which corresponds to a storage content of about 829,000 acre-feet. The monthly precipitation average in the basin above Bluff was only 20 percent of average for March. The basin wide snowpack on April 10 was 87 percent of normal for the Animas River basin, and 89 percent of normal for the upper San Juan River basin. On April 5, 2004, the National Weather Service's River Forecast Center issued an inflow forecast for Navajo Reservoir for the April through July runoff period. This forecast is projecting a volume runoffinto the reservoir of 600,000 acre-feet. This represents a 75 percent of normal runoff for the Upper San Juan River Basin.