South Platte - Ducks Unlimited_Weld Cnty School District Application_BRT_Final

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Water Supply Reserve Account -Grant Application Form Form Revised May 2007 The proximate benefit of this project is clear. The WCSD will be able to provide its students suitable areas to continue scholastic and athletic activties by providing irrigation water without injuring senior water users. The purpose of this project is to develop a more predictable water supply for the WCSD so that they will be able to irrigate the school grounds, sport fields and other facilities in Gilcrest, Platteville and other communities of southern Weld County. This project will allow for irrigation of future lands acquired as the district grows in size proportionate to the irrigation demands required currently. CCWCD estimates an annual accrual of over 500 acre feet of recharge accretions over aseven-year period. This amounts to enough credit under their Plan for Augmentation to allow WCSD to irrigate more than 20 acres of property currently waterless. There do exist, however, broader benefits from this work. This project will allow DU and CCWCD to test the working relationships necessary to successfully deliver a planned multi-million dollar expansion of the wetland recharge partnership into the middle reaches of the South Platte River in Colorado. This dry run of putting together a working project will aid significantly in identifying the strengths and weaknesses of the partner organizations in delivering more wetland recharge projects in Weld and Morgan counties. Moreover, this project will prove to outside funding agents like the North American Wetlands Conservation Council, the United States Department of Agriculture and the Colorado Division of Wildlife that projects like this provide a viable means for conserving wetland and wildlife habitat along this stretch of the South Platte River. This is crucial to our ability to access the millions of dollars of grant monies available from these sources (and others). Succesful delivery of this small-scale project will lay the groundwork for that larger effort. We also recognize the educational benefits the position of this project in the midst of Weld County and adjacent to a high school bestows and we fully intend to make the most of that opportunity. Our aim is to have this recharge project serve as a demonstration of the utility of wetland recharge projects in meeting water supply needs, providing habitat for wildlife, especially waterfowl, and the strength of consumptive/nonconsumptive partnerships. We will bring this message to water users, policymakers and the citizens of Colorado at large. We are particularly interested in investing the students of Weld County School District RE1 with a venue for particpating in hydrological, ecological and environmental studies related to the relationship between water use and biological communites in the Platte River basin of the state. WCSD, CCWCD, DU and other interested parties upon Succesful completion of this project will move forward with the development of a conservation curriculum based on the project that highlights the synergy between water supply development and wildlife conservation. 9