BOARD02069

• Board Meeting Date: 11/13/1968
• Description: Agenda or Table of Contents, Minutes, Memos
• Board Meetings - Doc Type: Meeting

eliminated and the water commissioner as
such would be eliminated in carrying out a
basin-wide concept plan.

I

One of the principal quarrels that you
receive from the water users is that they
all want an easier, more simplified way of
having these water rights determined and
a simpler method of working out these trans-
fer proceedings. So in line with Senate
Bills 37 and 40, passed by the last session
of the legislature, more authority in these
areas is going to be given to the division
engineer and to the state engineer under
these proposed tentative drafts.

I

Under the existing law the court can
appoint referees and the referee does most
of the fact-finding and presents these facts
to the court and if there are no protests
or objections the court enters the decree.
Now the theory here is to use the State
Engineer and his division engineers and
water officials as a fact-finding group,
namely a fact-finding board, that will go
out here and determine the facts in these
transfer matters, adjudication matters, and
make temporary rulings. These rulings will
then be presented to the court at regular
times each year, at regular dates throughout
the State of Colorado. People will be noti-
fied; there are adequate notice provisions
in here advi~ing people as to this work that
is being done and the transfers, and so
forth, that are going to be carried out
under these provisions, to take care of any
due process questions. But then it is taken
into this court, this water section of the
district court, where '~e will have a judge,
hopefully appointed, he will be appointed
from the division, but he will have some back-
ground and knowledge in these matters, so
that he can move through this and through the
maze of everything that we have to face during