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Witt I. but not. the supply for ranchers and farmers who needed it to irrigate crops and care for livestock, while other agricultural users wanted to be able to continue to sell their water rights to municipal users. Municipal and business leaders feared diminishing water supplies and deple- tions of non - renewable aquifers would adversely affect their local economies. Rafting companies, fishing guides and ski areas saw drought conditions hitting their bottom lines. At the same time, conservation groups and local govern- ments struggled to protect streams and river flows to safeguard natural habitats and species. Assessing the situation Colorado state legislators sought an initiative to meet the state's future water needs. The legislature asked the state Department of Natural Resources' Colorado Water Conservation Board (CWCB) to perform an 18 -month study Meeting four times in each basin from September 2003 through October 2004, the roundtable members exchanged ideas, reviewed water supply and demand data, identified and summarized planning initiatives, and helped guide the development of water supply and demand objectives and strategies. Each basin identified projects or strategies that are being planned or considered to meet its future water needs. SWSI's water management objectives and performance measures were used to gauge the ability of the solutions to meet the diverse range of interests of water providers and users. They ranged from meeting municipal, industrial and agricultural demands to enhancing recreational opportunities. One basin's experience The Arkansas River Basin, Colorado's largest basin, provides a good example of the water supply issues that stakehold- ers confronted statewide: balancing the tainous headwaters of the basin. Fur- thermore, 173,000 acre -feet of additional water storage will be needed to support growth in the Arkansas basin through 2040, according to a recent Southeast- ern Colorado Water Conservancy Dis- trict study. With so many competing demands for water, along with explosive population growth and stringent environmental requirements, SWSI incorporated the perspectives of all roundtable members. That was done by creating a list of statewide water management objectives and using them to evaluate future water supply options. The final set of water management objectives included sus - tainably meeting municipal, industrial and agricultural demands; optimizing existing and future water supplies; enhancing recreational opportunities; protecting cultural values; and comply- ing with all applicable laws, regulations and water rights. Coloradans will need an addi- tional 205 billion gallons per year of new water by 2030 to meet a projected 53 percent increase in demand. — the Statewide Water Supply Initiative (SWSI) — to determine how it would maintain an adequate water supply for its residents and the environment. Finding ways to accommodate the state's diverse interests, however, was a challenge. SWSI's approach was to con- duct technical roundtables that included representatives from multiple interests within each of Colorado's eight major river basins. They included local gov- ernments, water providers, agricultural users, recreational interests, the envi- ronmental community and the business sector. The roundtables' composition helped ensure that the full range of local priorities and expertise was reflected in the study's findings and solutions. needs of increased population growth with agricultural and recreational use. The Arkansas basin covers 19 coun- ties, including the Colorado Springs and Pueblo urban areas. Between 1990 and 2000, the population in the region increased by 27 percent and now accounts for nearly 20 percent of the state's residents. Consistent with overall state water use, 85 percent of the Arkansas basin's water is used to irrigate agricultural land, with about 1.7 million acre -feet diverted annually for irrigation out of a total 2 million acre -feet used. The basin also is popular for fishing and river rafting, which are both economically important to the area, particularly in the moun- After the objectives were decided, roundtable members could move away from individual agendas and toward meet- ing a broad range of needs. "The focus of the meetings was to build a consensus to address specific issues within the river basin," says Gary Barber, consultant for El Paso County Water Authority. Deci- sions were not based on majority rule, but, according to Barber, "on discussions seeking common ground between diverse interests. It helped us move away from a focus on what each group wanted to win and move toward what we, as a state, didn't want to lose." Once the roundtable developed water supply options for the Arkansas basin — such as building new storage, enlarg-