State/SPWRAP for Implementation of PRRIP Unresolved Issues

• Description: South Platte River Recovery Implementation Program
• State: CO
• State: NE
• State: WY
• Basin: South Platte
• Water Division: 1
• Date: 2/6/2006
• Author: SPWRAP, PRRIP
• Title: State/SPWRAP for Implementation of PRRIP Unresolved Issues
• Water Supply Pro - Doc Type: Report/Study

State / SPWRAP Agreement for Implementation of PRRIP
Unresolved Issues
1. Background
a. Colorado's participation in the 1997 Cooperative Agreement resulted from
USFWS consultations under ESA in early 1990s. FWS required the
creation of a recovery program for the Whooping Crane, Least Tern and
Piping Plover, and required federal permittees to participate in it.
b. Currently, there are 55 federal authorizations that involve water use in
Colorado and that require participation in such a program.
c. Aside from some relatively minor details that remain to be resolved, a
program in which Colorado could participate has been negotiated. It is
expected that either all three states (CO, NE, WY) and the Department of
Interior [FWS and BuRec directly ?] will execute an agreement to form that
program by approximately mid -July, or Nebraska will balk, and Colorado
will try to parlay the obligations to which it is ready to agree into a
Colorado -Only program.
d. In either event, Colorado may soon need to have in place the ability to pay
for its portion of a recovery program
e. For more than twelve years, during the negotiations that led to the '97
Cooperative Agreement and the negotiations since on the structure and
content of the Platte River Recovery Implementation Plan, a number of
water users within the South Platte basin have contributed personnel with
expertise in a variety of areas to assist the negotiators for Colorado in this
process. This expertise came both from employees of the water users
and from consultants and attorneys paid for by the water users. The State
also has contributed personnel from the Attorney General's Office, the
CWCB, and the Division of Wildlife.
This informal cooperation between Colorado water users and the State of
Colorado has worked well so far, but the PRRIP will create formal legal
obligations between the state and federal signatories that will replace a
loose, voluntary effort, and will involve costs at least two orders of
magnitude higher than those to date.
g. The recovery implementation plan for endangered fish species on the
Colorado River is funded by the State, as was the payment of Colorado's
liablilty that arose out of the Colorado v. Kansas litigation. Many in State
government and among the water users at one point assumed that the
State would fund this obligation also. In light of the State budget
conditions over the last several years, it began to appear that the State
Unres- Issues 2 -6 -06