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uphold Indian claims to receive approximately 1.2 million acre-feet of water, about one.third more than previously awarded to them. A 1983 Supreme Court decision rejected that recommendation. Indian Water Ri hts Some American Indians are working to exercise their rights to the Colorado Riverfor agricultural and M & fuses orfor leasing to potelllial buyers. Like many riV8Helated issues, tribal rights to water have been litigated for years. with the first key U.S. Supreme Court decision relative to the Colorado River occurring in 1963. For many years, American Indians have been unable to exercise all of their Colorado River and tributary rights, farming less than their full amount of irrigable acreage due to political, environmental and economic limitations. An agreement for off-reservation leasing of Indian Colorado River water has been submitted to the secretary of the Interior for approval. If implemented, such a proposal could have an impact on how Colorado River water is used in the future. The history of Indian court-adjudicated rights to water begins with the 1908 court decision in Winters v. United States. The court established that Indian water rights existed whether or not water was actually being used by the tribe. That decision was reaffirmed in the 1964 Arizona v. California decree in which the U.S. Supreme Court justices held that five lower Colorado River reservations "were not limited to land, but included waters as well:' The court determined that the only feasible and fair way reserved reserva- tion water could be measured is on the basis of practicable irrigable acreage (PIA). Indians were not restricted to using the water for agriculture. but off.reservation uses have rarely been recognized, nor were Indian water rights recognized when the Colorado River Compact was negotiated and signed in 1922. Thirty years after the Supreme Court decision. Indians are farming about 60 percent of their irrigable acreage on five lower Colorado River reservations. The tribes made additional claims in 1979 which the U.S. Supreme Court turned over to a Special Master. In 1982, the Special Master recommended the court < . 11 Estimates of how much Colorado River water Indians could lay claim to remain hazy. In Arizona, for example, approximately 3 million acre-feet of the Colorado River and its tributaries are being claimed by the tribes. Increasingly, Indian water rights claims are met through settlements, thus allowing both tribes and other water users relying on the source(s) in dispute certainty over rights. The largest Indian water rights settlement in the history of the United States could take place in Arizona with the Gila River Indian Community - composed of members from the Mariposa and Pima tribes - which holds claims to 1.5 million acre-feet of water from the Colorado River and its tributaries. Under the settlement. the tribe would receive 653.500 acre.feet annually. 328.500 of which would be provided through the CAP and from non-Indian water user supplies. The settlement has been tied to a repayment agreement between Arizona and Interior. funding from which could potentially be used to finance the Gila Community settlement and future Indian water rights claims. The broad and immensely complicated "Arizona Water Rights Settlement Act," also would meet Tohono O'Odham Nation and San Carlos Apache Tribe claims. Federal legislation and court decisions have granted tribes nearly 1 million acre-feet in the Upper Basin and nearly 1 million acre.feet of diversion rights in the Lower Basin. Yet. less than half of this water is actually being used by Indians. Some of the tribes with mainstream rights are anxious to lease their conserved water to other off reservation users. Such measures could have economic benefits for Indian tribes by allowing them to lease substantial amounts of water for municipal and industrial use, creating jobs and generating money. Some large water users already using the water the tribes now leave in the river may have to eventually pay for water consumed free for years. California's draft Colorado River water use plan recognizes the request of the Interior to provide a 16.000 acre-feet annual supply (to replace water taken by local non-Indian users) of water as part of the San Luis Rey Indian Water Rights Settlement in northern San Diego County. But. elsewhere. the claims of three tribes on the Colorado River - the Hualapai. Havasupai and the Navajo - have yet to be addressed.