BOARD00072

• Board Meeting Date: 11/25/2002
• Description: Report of the Attorney General
• Board Meetings - Doc Type: Memo

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Court's previous ruling on prejudgment interest, Colorado calculates damages for the 1950-94 .
period to be $29 million in 2002 dollars, while Kansas calculates damages to be over $53 million
in 2002 dollars.

4. Golden Boat Chute case, appeal to Colorado Supreme Court.

The Colorado Supreme Court heard oral argument on October 2. Steve Sims argued for the
state parties, and David Robbins argued for the amici in support of the state parties. Justice
Hobbs recused himself from the case at the request of Golden. The Justices asked few questions
of either side; thus both sides made all of the points they had planned to make. A decision is
expected in the next three to five months.

5. Applications of Ea21e River Water and Sanitation District (Case No. 00CW259) (aka
Vail) and Town of Breckenrid2e (Case No. 00CW281)

Opening Briefs for the state parties on the appeal of these cases are due December 2, 2002.

6. Application of Town of Telluride / Idarado Minin2 Company (Case No. 96CW313)

On October 29, 2002, after lengthy negotiations; the Applicants, the CWCB, the San Miguel
Valley Corporation, the Telluride Ski and Golf Company, Mountain Village Metropolitan
District, and Aldasoro Ltd. filed a settlement stipulation with the court. The settlement
establishes monthly flow rates for historical retuin flow releases to prevent injury to the
objectors' water rights, including the CWCB's instieam flows. That same week, the State and. _
Division Engineers signed a stipulation with the Applicants, leaving Eric Jacobson as the so16 .
objector remaining in the case. Less than a week before the first day of trial, the Applicants and
Mr. Jacobson resumed negotiations and reached a settlement.

7. Rio Grande Silvery Minnow v. Keys, No. 99 CV 1320, US District Court, District of
New Mexico.

The Appeal of the district court's order in Silvery Minnow v. Keys is proceeding. On October
17,2002, the 10th Circuit issued an order staying the district court's order. That district court
order said that the Bureau of Reclamation must maintain a 50 cfs flow in the San Acacia reach
and could use San Juan-Chama water to do so. The 10th Circuit also set an expedited briefing
schedule on the appeal.

Opening briefs were due on November 18. Colorado and several other states filed amicus
curiae briefs to support the State of New Mexico ill this appeal. The United States' opening
brief supported the position of the states that the Bureau may not "reallocate" water that is
subject to contracts, either from the San Juan-Chania Project or the Middle Rio Grande Project,
for the purpose of preventing "jeopardy" to an endljIlgered species.

The group working on minnow recovery is still apparently considering somehow obtaining
water from Colorado and transferring it downstream to assist the minnow recovery. Steve
Vandiver, Division 3 Engineer, sent the group an e.mail explaining that water from Colorado
was not available, for various legal and engineering reasons. He told the group that the Closed
Basin Project could not legally or practically pump any more than it already was. The Bureau's

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