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Colorado Basin Carlyle Currier Alternative I support this visioning exercise as it represents the type of discussions we need to be having. I don't think, however, that anyone can accurately predict what CO will look like in 50 years. Looking back 50 years, the ski and other recreation industries were virtually non-existent. While there were predictions of oil shale development, the biggest energy industry in western CO was uranium, and hard rock mining was much more active than today. Communities now dominated by second homes and resorts were then totally centered around ag. But we do know the type of changes we have seen over the last 50 years will continue and possibly accelerate, and we need to plan and decide what we can and should do to best accommodate growth and protect the values which make us want to call CO home. Water policy decisions can not be made in a vacuum. The growth and changes in this state will continue to be driven by social and economic factors. Water policy can influence but not control what happens. The big factors include things like the cost of food. A century ago, Americans spent half of their income for food so had little left for spending on things like recreation nor the option of choosing where to live based factors like scenic amenities or lifestyle. Today, we spend less than 9% of income on food and much more on recreation. Over the same time, the percentage of the population working in agriculture has decreased from a third to less than 1 %. Fifty years ago, most people worked as long as they were physically able to do so, yet today we are rapidly reaching a time when there will be more people retired or otherwise "idle" than actually in the workforce. While I am not sure these levels can be sustained, they are driving our society today. We need to decide what we want the future to look like, what it will cost to get there, and if the costs are worth it. The free market considers only present basic economic values and not social or environmental benefits. If irrigated agriculture is to be maintained in CO, we need to find a way to place a value on and pay for things like food security, open space, wildlife habitat, late season instream flows generated by return flows and recharged shallow aquifers. The Federal Farm programs began in the 1930's because of very real concerns about food supply, and have been very successful in providing the consumer with cheap, abundant food while at the same time sometimes damaging the farm economy. As has often been stated, land use policies need to be more closely tied to water policy. We need to work for win/win solutions and move beyond the long time battles of west vs. east, urban vs. ag, surface vs. ground water, etc. More storage is needed to store available water from wet years like this for dry years we know we will have. 28 I:\INTERBASIN COMPACT COMMITTEEWISIONS FOR COLORADO WATER SUPPLY FUTURE\RESPONSES TO VISIONING AND MARCH MEETING\IBCC REPRESENTATIVE COMMENTS.DOC