BOARD00226

• Board Meeting Date: 4/1/1970
• Description: Agenda or Table of Contents, Minutes, Memos
• Board Meetings - Doc Type: Meeting

to Improve the South Platte River Channel,
Denver to Ft. Morgan'. We have had some in-
formation on that before. Larry, will you
start this out?"

MR. SPARKS:

"In the 1950 Flood Control Act, Congress
authorized the construction of the Chatfield
Reservoir. Tragically enough through the in-
action of the State of Colorado that reservoir
was never constructed. It is now under way.
As part of the same act, there was authorized
some channel improvement for part of Boulder
Creek which we have already discussed and the
entire channel of the South Platte River from
Chatfield Dam to the vicinity of Fort Morgan.
As part of the Chatfield Project about 7 miles
of channel improvement is being included. That
will be accomplished assuming that the state
can fulfill its obligation to secure the rights-
of-way for that part of the channel. Our
appraisal on the rights-of-way which is being
done through this Board and the engineering
is about completed.

That leaves the rest of the South Platte
channel from about the city limits of Denver
on downstream which badly needs rectification.
This past year in excess of $25 million worth
of damages were incurred along the South Platte
channel and in some of the upstream tributaries
such as Left Hand Creek. No matter how many
reservoirs or how many dams are constructed on
any river, there still remains the possibility
that channel flooding will occur. The South
Platte channel is in very bad shape throughout
most of its reaches. It was the overflow from
the rainfall that we had last year that created
millions of dollars worth of damages along the
channel itself.

It will be necessary to now review the old
project authorization, bring it up to date and
to prepare a modern feasibility report to deter-
mine whether or not it is economically feasible
to rehabilitate the South Platte channel. As

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