7901

• UCREFRP Catalog Number: 7901
• Author: Upper Colorado River Commission.
• Title: Forty-Seventh Annual Report of the Upper Colorado River Commission.
• USFW Year: 1995.
• USFW - Doc Type: Salt Lake City, Utah.
• Copyright Material: NO

period used in the Upper Colorado Region Comprehensive Framework Studies
of 1971. The average annual virgin flow for the 1914-1965time period is
14.6 million acre-feet.
(7) The average annual virgin flow for the period 1914-1945 is 15.6
million acre-feet. This was the period of record used by the negotiators of
the Upper Colorado River Basin Compact of 1948.
(8) For the period 1922-1995, which is the period of record since the
signing of the Colorado River Compact, the average annual virgin flow is 14.2
million acre-feet and the average annual historic flow is 11 .0 million acre-feet.
Records for this series of years are based upon actual measurements of flows
at Lees Ferry. The ten-year moving average flow since 1922 is considerably
less than the ten-year moving average flow prior to 1922.
(9) Two completely unrelated ten-year periods of minimum flows have
occurred since 1930. During these periods, 1931-1 940and 1954-1963, the
average annual virgin flow amounts to only 11.8 million acre-feet.
(10) For a 12-year period, 1953-1964, the average annual virgin flow
amounts to only 11.6 million acre-feet.
(11) Since Glen Canyon Dam was closed in 1963, the estimated virgin
flow for tne subsequent 33 years is 14.6 million acre-feet. The estimated
historical flow for the same period (1963-1995) is 9.6 million acre-feet.

B. LEGAL
1. Water Newsletter

The legal staff continues to inform the Commissioners, their advisers,
and other interested parties about developments in the courts, Congress, and
certain Federal agencies through the Water News/etter. Current information
can be found in the newsletter. In addition, the legal staff has prepared legal
memoranda on matters needing more detailed treatment.

2. Court Cases

Action has been taken in a number of cases of importance to the Upper
Colorado River Basin States. These cases include:

Babbitt v. Sweet Home Chapter of Communities for a Great Oregon,
515 U.S. _,132 L.Ed.2d 597, 115 S.Ct. . Respondents Sweet Home
brought this declaratory judgment action against petitioners including the
Secretary of the Interior (Secretary) challenging on its face a regulation
promulgated by the Secretary pursuant to the Endangered Species Act of
1973 (ESA). The issue in the case is whether the Secretary exceeded his
authority under the ESA by promulgating a regulation that defines the
statute's prohibition on taking endangered or threatened species to include
"significant habitat modification or degradation where it actuallv kills or

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