Notice and Agenda of Sub-Committee Meeting and Recreational Instream Flows

• Description: SB 01-26
• State: CO
• Date: 10/30/2000
• Author: CWCB, Eric W. Wilkinson
• Title: Notice and Agenda of Sub-Committee Meeting and Recreational Instream Flows
• Water Supply Pro - Doc Type: Board Memo

Recreational Instream Flows - Questions, Concerns, and Statutory Considerations
considered a waste. This situation would thus eliminate the need for continued
enforcement of the administrative call. Further, a future call imposed by the appropriator
of the RISF right would be precluded until it could be shown that the RISF right would
actually be used for the decreed beneficial use. This course of action would be no
different than an irrigation right or a municipal right calling for water and, when made
available by actions of the representatives of the State Engineer's Office, the appropriator
of that calling right then not diverting and utilizing the water for the adjudicated
beneficial use.
If continuing use of the RISF is necessary for an administrative call for the RISF right to
be imposed and continued, the State Engineer's Office would have to monitor the use of
the RISF in the designated benefiting reach of the stream on a continuing basis and
determine when the imposition and/or enforcement of the call would be considered valid
and when it would be considered a waste. Such monitoring could add a significant cost to
the administration and enforcement of this type of water right. Also, the stream system
may not be able to react to such short-term calls that may vary significantly. Further,
junior water rights would have to react to the resulting changes in the stream system
caused by the imposition or elimination of RISF calls. Issues of anticipated
administrative calls, stream gains and losses associated with water rights curtailment and
delivery of water to the calling RISF, and the travel or lag time associated with
administering a call imposed by a RISF are all significant considerations.
4. Is it necessary for an appropriator of a RISF right to schedule the recreational
activities and have beneficiaries of the right available to beneficially use the water
before the representative of the State Engineer's Office will anticipate or recognize a
call for the RISF right?
Discussion:
As does an irrigator or other appropriator of more conventional beneficial uses, the
appropriator of a RISF right may be required to ensure that the water that was being
called and delivered would actually be used for recreational beneficial use before
imposing the administrative call. This would be required to prevent waste of the water
being called.
Sporadic use of a RISF could cause inefficiencies in water administration. The
administration of these water rights could theoretically require additional manpower —not
only for the State Engineer's Office, but for appropriators of other junior rights as other
junior appropriators may be subject to the intermittent imposition of calls for the RISF
rights or variations in stream flows (under the assumption that enforcement of the
administrative call for the RISF would be a waste if the right is not actively being used
for recreation –i.e., the called water is flowing downstream with minimal or no
recreational use in the stream reach designated). However, the junior rights should be
aware of this requirement at the time of their appropriation and adjudication as the RISF
right would be an existing condition on the stream.
EN