BOARD00667

• Board Meeting Date: 3/16/2004
• Description: WSP Section - Statewide Water Supply Initiative ‎(SWSI)‎ Status Update
• Board Meetings - Doc Type: Memo

.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
'.
,

.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.

. THE SALT LAKE TRIBUNE

Friday, January 30, 2004

Colorado wrestlesw'ith water problems amid a
drought year

By Ben Kieckhefer
The Associated Press

NORTIlGLENN, Colo. -- With another year of drought looming, officials charged with managing
Colorado's tight water supply met Thursday to find ways to share the increasingly rare commodity.
Meeting at the Colorado Water Congress' annual gathering in this Denver suburb are one-time .foes who
have been forced to work together to find solutions to the state's water woes.
Compounding the below-average snowpack and already low rivers and reservoirs is the fact Colorado voters
this fall rejected a statewide referendum authorizing $2 billion in bonds for water projects.
The fight over that referendum was expensive and nasty, with many western Colorado groups fearing the
unspecified projects would amount to nothing more than a water grab by the ever-thirsty Front Range, the area
east of the Continental Divide. Much of the Front Range water is piped from the western part of the state.
"The people of Colorado spoke in Referendum A that you have to give us a proposal that works for
everybody, not just one side," said T. Wright Dickinson, chairman of Club 20, a powerful lobbying group of
Western Slope business and government leaders.
Now water experts are hoping that by working together they will be able to guide the state through the
drought and bring lasting solutions to pressures created by scarce water and the demands from a growing
population.
How that goal will be accomplished, however, is still open for debate.
"We have to build storage," said state agriculture Commissioner Don Ament. "Granted, Referendum A
obviously wasn't the answer, but we have to find a way to store the water Colorado has rights to under all these
compacts."
Increased storage would provide additional water to the Front Range, ensure, farmers and ranchers across the
state have the water they need to survive and replenish drying aquifers, Ament said.
He said a number of storage projects could start within a year, including several along the South Platte River
Basin, which is currently at just 62 percent of average snowpack.
Melting snow contributes about 80 percent ofthe water in the state's rivers, streams, lakes and reservoirs.
Eight major Colorado river systems also provide water to 10 Western states.
Ament said capturing excess water in the good times would help deal with dry times.
"I really feel a need to get going on this," Ament said. "It's just a waste of some precious time."
But water storage is just one part of an equation tbat also includes conservation and, developing new sources
of water for the areas that are most in need, s\tid Peter Binney, director of utilities in t6e fast-growing suburb of
Aurora.
Developing new sources includes capturing water from areas currently untapped, or reallocating water
already being used. Binney said conservation alone won't provide enough new water.
Aurora will continue its water restrictions this year because of the drought and low reservoir levels.
Agriculture uses 85 percent ofthe state's water, amounting to about 15 million acre-feet each year. The
Front Range, including the Denver area, will need only about 500,000 acre-feet of that, Binney said.
An acre-foot, about 326,000 gallons, can meet the annual water needs of one to two U.S. households.