Letter from Colorado River District

• Description: Documents related to the Little Snake River RMP
• State: CO
• Basin: Yampa/White/Green
• Water Division: 6
• Date: 9/21/2010
• Author: Colorado River District
• Title: Protest of the BLM's Wild and Scenic River Suitability Determinations
• Water Supply Pro - Doc Type: Correspondence

Page 4 of 6
CRWCD Protest of Proposed Little Snake Resource Management Plan and Final Environmental
Impact Statement
September 13, 2010
designation. Included in this analysis must be the "reasonably foreseeable potential uses of land
and related waters that would be enhanced, foreclosed, or curtailed if the area were included in
the national wild and scenic rivers system." 16 U.S.C. §1275(a). Further, the BLM must analyze
the historical or existing rights which could be adversely affected. BLM Manual, 8351.33.A.7.
i. Impacts on Future Appropriations
While the PRMP/FEIS recognizes that historically a Wild and Scenic River designation
by Congress has included an implied federal reserved water right, PRMP/FEIS, 4-29, it fails to
analyze what the impact of such a right would have on future water appropriations in the basin
and the associated implications for the State of Colorado.
As noted in the River District's earlier comments on the draft EIS, the State of Colorado
is struggling to meet its future water demands as evidenced by the Statewide Water Supply
Investigation and the process established by the Colorado Water for the 21st Century Act. C.R.S.
§37-75-101 et seq. Any federal reserved right resulting from a designation would need to be in
an amount necessary to ensure that the BLM-identified outstandingly remarkable values
("ORV") are not impaired. The PRMP/FEIS discussion of impacts to water resources lacks any
meaningful analysis of the impacts that a federal reserved water right would have on future
appropriations. Nor does it include any impacts analysis of the implications of such a
designation on a state already struggling to meet its future water demands.
Foreclosing options to meet Colorado's future water needs is not in the best interest of
Colorado nor does it meet the requirements of the Federal Land Policy Management Act — that
BLM's land use plans and public land management be consistent with state and local
government plans, programs, and policies to the greatest extent possible. 43 U.S.C. §1712(c)(9).
Certainly future water development projects in a state struggling to meet demands qualifies as "a
reasonably foreseeable potential use of ... water which would be ... foreclosed if the area were
included in the wild and scenic rivers system ..." and this reasonably foreseeable impact should
have been addressed in the PRMP/FEIS. 16 U.S.C. §1275.
ii. Impacts of decreed water rights
The River District owns multiple conditional water rights in the Yampa River basin,
including conditional water storage rights for Juniper Reservoir and Cross Mountain Reservoir
that are jeopardized by a suitability determination or designation. These water storage projects
have a decreed, combined capacity in excess of 1,000,000 acre feet and should have been more
thoroughly analyzed as existing rights which would be adversely affected in the event of a
suitability determination, as required by the BLM Manual. BLM Manual, 8351.33.A.7.
In assessing the impacts of a suitability determination on water rights the PRMP/FEIS
explains that BLM involvement would only be triggered if the "water rights applicant required
access to BLM lands for the development of the water right." PRMP/FEIS at 4-28. The