7936

• UCREFRP Catalog Number: 7936
• Author: McDonald, J. W.
• Title: A Primer On Colorado's Water Policies.
• USFW Year: 1988.
• USFW - Doc Type: \
• Copyright Material: NO

will be used and allocated, the state has had a clear policy on
water resources development for several decades. That policy,
which has been premised upon the objective of putting all of
Colorado's compact entitlements to beneficial consumptive use,
has had three major elements:
(1) Reliance on the federal government to finance,
construct and largely pay for (i.e., federal expenditures
were not repayable to the U.S. or were repayable only in
part and often without interest) major irrigation and flood
control projects,
(2) Reliance on industrial users to finance, construct,
and pay for their own water development projects, and
(3) ~Relianc.e on municipalities to finance, construct, and
pay for their own water development projects, with federal
loan and grant assistance being sought in the case of
smaller rural communities.
State government, of course, has actively participated in
only the first of these three areas. However, its support of
federal projects has led to substantial and tangible results.
In particular, the state policy .of seeking and promoting
federal projects has resulted in substantially greater amounts
of water being used in.irrigation than would have otherwise
been the case. This is because the federal government has
provided substantial subsidies which have enabled water
resources development to occur which would not have otherwise
occurred had water rights holders had to utilize private
financing to construct their projects. The federal
government's programs in this regard, and the state's
aggressive utilization of"them, reflect a major social policy
for settling the state, diversifying its economic base, and
realizing the beneficial consumptive use of its compact
entitlements.
In the face of reductions in federal funding programs, the
state embraced a major new policy in 1971 with the creation of
the Colorado Water Conservation Board (CWCB) construction
fund. The fund is used to make long-term, low interest loans
for the construction of new water resources projects and the
repair and rehabilitation of existing projects. Because the
terms of these loans are substantially more favorable than what
is available from commercial lending institutions, this program
represents an extension of the federal subsidization policy for
water resources development, albeit at a vastly reduced scale
given the limitations on the availability of state appropria-
tions to the construction fund. As with the federal programs,
the thrust of the CWCB construction fund program is to benefit
irrigated agriculture and small rural communities.
-5-