BOARD00851

• Board Meeting Date: 11/23/1998
• Description: ISF Section - Instream Flow Subcommittee Draft Report
• Board Meetings - Doc Type: Memo

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As indicated in Table 1, the general issue of appropriating instream flow rights for "other
instream flow uses" was raised in several ISF progranunatic areas. Within the New
Appropriations programmatic area, the participants indicated a desire for the CWCB to consider
values other than fisheries and to protect amoUIlts in excess of minimum when appropriating new
instream flow rights. Under the ISF Methodologies progranunatic area, the participants believed
that the CWCB should consider quantification methods that result in recommendations for
optimum rather than minimum flows. They (llso indicated a desire for the CWCB to acquire
water rights to protect "other uses" under the Donations and Acquisitions progranunatic area.

Table 1 also indicates the participant's desire to see the Board clarify, and possibly re-evaluate,
its policy on inundation of instream flow water rights and to expand its streamflow monitoring
efforts to physically protect the instream flow water rights that it currently holds.

CWCB staff met on several occasions following the May 18, 1998, meeting to discuss the results
of the Subcommittee process. These staff meetings provided an opportunity to evaluate some of
the historic trends in the evolution of the ISF Program as they relate to the Subcommittee process
and the future direction of the ISF Program.

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Historic Trends in the Evolution of Colorado's ISF Program
In 1973, the Colorado State Legislature vested the CWCB with "exclusive authority" to
appropriate "such water's of natural streams and lakes as the board determines may be required
for minimum stream flows or for natural surface water levels or volumes of natural lakes to
preserve the natural environment to a reasonabl~ degree."

Colorado's ISF Program has undergone an interesting evolution since its inception in 1973. As
indicated in Figure I, the CWCB began an aggressive effort to appropriate instream flow water
rights shortly after the ISF Program was initiated. Figure 1 iIlso indicates that the need to protect
the Board's rights was minimal at that time beC(luse there were only a few instream flow rights to
protect.

By 1985, the CWCB held decreed instream flow water rights on approximately 1,000 stream
segments. Around that time, ISF Program emphasis began to shift from new appropriations to
legal protection of the CWCB' s decreed instre3IIl flow rights. Increasing amounts of staff time
and resources were required to oppose and resolve water court applications that could potentially
injure the CWCB' s instream flow rights. As a result, total numbers of new appropriations began
to decline~

Today, the CWCB holds approximately 1,325 instream flow water rights covering over 8,000
miles of Colorado streams. As the number of ISF rights has grown and water development has
been very active over the last decade, legal protection of these decreed ISF water rights has
required increasing amounts of staff time. Physical protection of ISF rights, through stream flow
monitoring/gaging, is also requiring additional staff time to ensure that the terms and conditions

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