BOARD01677

• Board Meeting Date: 7/26/1999
• Description: CWCB Director's Report
• Board Meetings - Doc Type: Memo

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Powell is to ensure that the lower basin allocation can be supplied without limiting upper basin
uses, even in dry years. Therefore, we urged policies that will keep it as full as possible.

Gunnison River Basin

Black Canyon Bill Advances: S.323, the Black Canyon National Park and Gunnison
Gorge National Conservation Area Act of 1999, sponsored by Sen. Ben Nighthorse Campbell,
passed the U.S. Senate on July 1 and has been referred to the Committee on Resources. The bill
redesignates the Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Monument as a national park and
establishes the Gunnison Gorge National Conservation Area. The CWCB endorsed the water
rights language in the bill in March 1999.

Rio Grande River Basin

Critical Habitat Designated for Silvery Minnow: On July 6, 1999 (Federal Register,
Volume 64, Numberl28, Ru1es and Regulations, page 36274-36290) the USFWS published the
Final Designation of Critical Habitat for the Rio Grande Silvery Minnow. The Rio Grande
silvery minnow presently occurs only in the Rio Grande from Cochiti Dam downstream to the
headwaters of Elephant Butte Reservoir, New Mexico, approximately five percent of its known
historical range. The critical habitat overlays this remaining portion of its occupied range. It
encompasses163 miles of the mainstem Rio Grande, downstream from the State Highway 22
bridge crossing the Rio Grande immediately downstream of Cochiti Dam, to the crossing of the
Atchi~on Topeka and Santa Fe Railroad near San Marcial, New Mexico. The rule becomes
effective August 5, 1999.

San Juan and Dolores River Basin

San Juan-Chama Project Operations: Following the meeting I reported on last winter,
we met with Bureau of Reclamation staff in Albuquerque to continue our discussion of the
relationship between San Juan Chama Project operations and the protection of streamflow in the
Rio Blanco and Navajo River. These meetings with Albuquerque Area Manager Mike Gabal<!on
were convened at my request in order to explore opportunities for reconciling project operations
with our instream flow water rights. The federal authorizing legislation stipulates that the project
operations are not to injure existing or future uses in Colorado within our compact allocation.

At the conclusion of our July 7 meeting, we agreed to explore two opportunities in further
detail and agreed that it wou1d be most appropriate to include New Mexico representatives in all
future consideration. The first opportunity we will examine involves a potential reduction of
May bypass flows for both the Rio Blanco and Navajo River to approximately the level of the
CWCB instream flow water rights in order to maintain project yield and our June-October
instream flow protection levels for the Rio Blanco. The second area for exploration is the basis
for the disparities between flow protection determinations made by the Bureau of Reclamation
and the CWCB for the Rio Blanco. In addition, based upon a preliminary assessment of project
diversions and storage, I have formally requested that the Bureau consider increasing the flows
bypassed at the Rio Blanco diversion structure to approximately 30 cfs as soon as possible (copy
attached). I have also conveyed this information to Norm Gaume, New Mexico Interstate

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