BOARD00543

• Board Meeting Date: 7/28/2003
• Description: CWCB Director's Report
• Board Meetings - Doc Type: Memo

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completion of the Project so the Operating Entity can be involved during construction and initial
operations during reservoir filling.

Also, the CWCB has been cooperating with the Attorney General and others as necessary in the
modifications to the project water rights necessitated by the passage of the Colorado Ute Indian Water
Rights Settlement Act Amendments of2000. A hearing was held on certain legal motions June 6th.
Finally, as a result ofIast years drought, the San Juan Water Commission has asked Colorado ifit
might be interested in selling some of Colorado's allocated project storage. La Plata County has made
a similar request ofthe Board.

San Juan River Recovery Implementation Program: Hydrologic conditions remain extremely dry
year in the San Juan Basin. Upcoming events for the Program include:

· July 16 - 17 - Biology Committee Integration Subgroup Meeting. The Biological and Physical
Subgroups will meet together for the first time to look at integration information from the last 3
years. The meeting will be at the Farmington Civic Center. It will begin at 9 am on the 16th and
will go until 3 pm on the 17th. A trip to the PNM fish passage structure is planned after the
meeting on the 16th.

· August 5 - Hydrology Committee Meeting. 8:30 am - 4:00 pm at the Farmington Civic Center

· August 26 - 9:30 am - dedication of fish passage structure at PNM Wier

· August 26 - I - 4:30 pm - Coordination Committee meeting at the Bureau of Land Management
Office (1235 LaPlata Highway). Agenda items are anticipated to include new contracting
procedures, discussion of next year's scopes of work, discussion of progress on the Long-Range
Plan revisions and status reports from the Biology and Hydrology Committees.

Navajo Dam and Reservoir Re-operations EIS: In response to the San Juan River Recovery
Implementation Program's flow recommendations for the Sari Juan River, Reclamation is preparing an
EIS on the re-operation of Navajo Dam to meet those flow recommendations. The CWCB has been
participating as a cooperating agency. The DEIS public comment period ended on December 4, 2002
with 350 comment letters received. As of June 5 the document was in the internal review process.
The completion schedule now shows that a final EIS will be released in late November, 2003 and the
Record of Decision sometime in February 2004. A Preliminary Final EIS (PFEIS) will be provided to
the cooperating agencies in late August or early September. A final cooperating agency meeting will
be held during late October in Farmington. Maintaining the temporary base flow of350 cfs through
critical habitat continues given the drought conditions.

YampalWhite River Basin

Little Snake River Compact Investigation: in response to the Three Forks Ranch Corporation
lawsuit against the City of Cheyenne and the State of Wyoming, the CWCB, the Colorado Attorney
General and the Colorado Division of Water Resources undertook ajoint investigation into those
allegations. The results of this investigation were made public on January 29, 2003. On January 10,
2003 a hearing was held in Colorado District Court before Judge Daniel. Judge Daniel issued his
opinion in this case on February 28,2003. He granted Wyoming's Rule 12(b) and 19 motions to
dismiss. He also granted the City of Cheyenne's motion to dismiss pursuant to 12(b)(2), (3), (6) and
(7). He denied the remaining motions as moot and ordered that the entire case be dismissed with
prejudice. We received notice June 21,2003 that the case has been appealed, however, we are not
aware of any hearing schedule at this time. We have also recently received a response from Wyoming
concerning our report on this matter and we will be following up with them. Staffwill discuss with the

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