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Social, Economic, and Physical Impacts <br /> Providing water to the Vallecito Water Company will have significant positive social impacts by <br /> providing an adequate quantity of good quality drinking water to people that presently do not <br /> have adequate quantity or quality of drinking water. LaPlata County is developing master land <br /> use plans for the County,the water system will be coordinated with the master plans. <br /> The project will have a positive economic impact by providing drinking water to homes without <br /> adequate water and the sale of the water will provide additional revenue to PRID for <br /> improvement of the irrigation delivery systems to about 45,000 acres. <br /> The project will have no significant physical impacts once construction is complete because all <br /> of the pipelines will be buried. The raw water facilities will also be in existing buildings, buried <br /> pipelines, or inside existing restricted areas. The treatment plant and water tank will be located <br /> to minimize the visual impact from the main County Road. <br /> Permitting <br /> The raw water diversion facilities, treatment plant and storage tank will be located on Federal <br /> land dedicated to Vallecito Reservoir. The agreement with USBR for the existing shops and <br /> offices will be expanded to include the new facilities. The agreement will require an <br /> environmental assessment including wetlands and archeological evaluations which will be <br /> performed; however,the facility area has already been disturbed and there are no wetlands. <br /> The agreement will trigger endangered species act considerations, particularly the endangered <br /> fish. The water supply for the project has historically been irrigation water but will now be used <br /> for domestic purposes. The water rights allow multiple uses, as described above. The PRID <br /> domestic water supply was included in the historic uses in the San Juan River basin as irrigation <br /> and this is a conversion, not a new diversion; in fact, the 3,000 acre-foot ultimate domestic water <br /> use will have a much smaller depletion than when used for irrigation so actually there will be <br /> more water in the San Juan River than there has been historically. Discussions with US Fish and <br /> Wildlife Service will be conducted as part of the land agreement. <br /> The distribution pipelines will primarily be constructed on LaPlata County easements and rights <br /> of way. <br /> On site discussion have been held with the Army Corps of Engineers regarding 404 permitting. <br /> The raw water facilities do not require a permit or exemption because the river channel is not <br /> impacted. The only 404 permitting will be where the distribution lines impact channels or <br /> wetlands. <br /> 8 <br />