Board Meeting 02/16/1984

• Board Meeting Date: 2/16/1984
• Description: Minutes, Agenda, Memorandums February 16, 1984
• Board Meetings - Doc Type: Meeting

• legislation in this regard was packaged with, and contingent
upon, making power revenues payable to the Upper Division states .
Rescoping of Authorized Projects
At the January 5-6 meeting, the Board directed that I work
with interested parties to rescope Colorado ' s four remaining
authorized projects. To that end, meetings have been held with
the San Miguel, West Divide, and Fruitland-Mesa Water Conservancy
Districts and the conceptual outlines of new projects for each
district have been worked out with them. The staff is also in
the process of re-examining the Savery-Pothook project.
While the three above-mentioned districts have all indicated
a willingness to proceed with the rescoping of new projects for
their districts, each has indicated that they will need more
detailed information about the configuration of, and water
developed by, any rescoped project before they can reach a final
decision on how to proceed. As a corollary, each has also
indicated that they could not consider the de-authorization of
their federal project until they were assured that any rescoped
project would in fact be financed with CRSP power revenues
payable directly to the state.
In order to respond to these legitimate concerns, I believe
• that the Board should provide funding to quickly do reconnais-
sance studies of the rescoped projects which have been outlined
with the three districts. The authority to provide such funding
from the CWCB construction fund is found in section
37-60-122 ( 1) (c) , C.R.S . 1973 , as amended, which states that:
"The board may also cause a feasibility report to be prepared on
any other water project proposed in this state whether funded by
the . . . construction fund or by any other source or entity . . . . "
Y Y Y • • ' •
See the "Recommendations" section below for my thoughts on how to
proceed in this regard.
Other Projects
As the attached detailed outline of Colorado ' s proposal
indicates CRSP power revenues are sought only for the financing
of enough water projects to achieve the level of development
contemplated by Colorado ' s remaining four authorized projects .
These authorized projects represent what Colorado bargained for
and got. We believe that revenues from the CRSP power system
should be made available to finance an equivalent level of
development if Congress is going to renege on its obligation to
fund authorized projects in the Upper Basin.
Since the rescoping of the authorized projects , as discussed
above, will result in substantially smaller projects, the
rescoped projects will not achieve the originally contemplated
110 level of development. Therefore, at this time Colorado must
either identify additional projects for developing the waters of
the Colorado River system which would be financed with CRSP power
MEMORANDUM -3- February 14, 1984