Endangered Species Cooperative Agreement & Water Action Plan

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MEMORANDUM To: Colorado Water Conservation Board From: Rick Brown, Platte River Coordinator, Interstate Streams Investigation Randy Seaholm, Chief, Interstate Streams Investigation Date: July 17, 2000 Subject: Agenda Item 19.d., July 24-25, 2000 Board Meeting. Platte River Endangered Species Cooperative Agreement. 1. Introduction In 1997 the Governors of the states of Colorado, Nebraska and Wyoming signed an agreement with the Department of Interior to improve and/or study the habitat of four endangered species in the Central Platte River in Nebraska. The proposed program has three components: water, land, and monitoring and research. This memorandum will highlight the status of the negotiations and summarize some of the key activities of several of the Cooperative Agreement (CA) Committees. II. Status of Negotiations Negotiation of a long-term agreement could begin as early as January 2001. Colorado's willingness to enter into negotiations is of coarse contingent on the acceptability of the proposed program elements, and the outcome of the National Environmental Policy Act evaluation process. III. Status of Cooperative Agreement Activities The focus of our work effort over the last two months has begun to shift from individual committee activities to assembling the individual pieces into a"proposed program" which can undergo National Environmental Policy Act evaluation. As we begin to assemble the proposed program it is apparent that considerable work has been completed. However, we have also identified many tasks which are not complete and there is some concern that some of these tasks may be rolled forward as work tasks to be completed during the implementation of the proposed program. Our challenge is to complete as much work as possible in order to increase the level of certainty associated with the proposed program. However, in some cases there is either insufficient time andlor limited information to make definitive decisions. In these cases it may make sense to move completion of the tasks forward. We will continue to carefully assess the level of detail and certainty that Colorado can accept. A brief summary of the status of important individual committee activities is provided below: • The Water Action Plan was once again the center of attention. In May and June we saw the three states pull together and reach the water goal of 130,000-150,000 acre feet! The precise quantity of water is being defined by modeling efforts but we have confidence that we will at least make the lower limit.