BOARD00744

• Board Meeting Date: 7/10/1973
• Description: Agenda or Table of Contents, Minutes, Memos
• Board Meetings - Doc Type: Meeting

think we ought to study this thing and get a lot of these things
answered before we go any further into this thing.

Mr. Stapleton: All right. I think Mr. Saunders was next. No, Mr.
Barnard was before you, I am sorry. Mr. Barnard.

I

Mr. Barnard: Mr. Chairman, on one of the minor issues that was dis-
cussed here, I recall the difficulties some people in southern Colorado
had some years ago where the San Isabel National Forest was established
and grazing was permitted. And by a series of reductions of allotment
it is no longer permitted. I think one can just anticipate the same
thing will occur here. But that is a minor issue perhaps as far as the
water board is concerned.

But I would suggest to the water board the magic word that I heard and
it rang a bell in my mind perhaps because of my orientations, and that
was the word "reservation." I would like to know whether or not these
studies contemplate a quantification of the amount of water that would
be necessary to pass Grand Junction in order to maintain this as a white
water area. Unless that is quantified and that quantity counted against
the flow of the Colorado River, we might well be creating a reservation
of the water that is necessary to maintain this as a scenic and wild
river which for all practical purposes puts a senior call on this river
at the state line that could be senior to every other water right.

I was, as you know, at one time chairman of the water rights committee
of the National Bar Association and some years before that vice-chairman.
I know the difficulties that we had in trying to get Congress to adopt
the legislation relating to state water rights. For us at this time to
say we have no objections to a study to establish a scenic river without
making it clear that that study should comprehend not just the water
flowing through this area but the waters arising upon and flowing through~
the reserved areas of the state of Colorado, and the quantity of water
that would be required to maintain this particular reservation for its
purposes, I think would be a serious mistake on the part of the board.
And having been led down that primrose path of the reservation theory
before, I would think the board would be most well advised to examine I
that proposition quite carefully. I would suggest that that is something
that could very adversely affect not only the development of the water
in this stretch of the river, but the development of all the waters of
the Colorado rivers, including the Uncompahgre and the Gunnison.

Mr. Stapleton: Thank you, Mr. Barnard. Mr. Saunders.

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