BOARD02475

• Board Meeting Date: 3/21/2002
• Description: CWCB Director's Report
• Board Meetings - Doc Type: Memo

Drought and Water Supply Assessment: Bouvette Consulting won the bid to conduct your Drought and
. Water Supply Assessment. We have an item on our agenda to update you about this project.

Drought Task Force: The Colorado Drought Task Force met on Feb. 27 to discuss current statewide
conditions. The Task Force concluded that most of Colorado is experiencing moderate drought conditions.
January precipitation was below average statewide (1981 and 1990 were the last winters with a similar
snowpack on February 1 and both of those years turned into drought years). Statewide reservoir storage is
87 percent of average and stream flow forecasts for this spring are mostly in the "much below average"
range.

Your staff and Tracy Bouvette also made a presentation to the Drought Task Force regarding the CWCB's
Drought and Water Supply Assessment. Tracy provided a handout showing the proj ect approach and gave a
brief presentation on how the survey will proceed. In the past, the Task Force has shown a great deal of
interest in this project and continues wanting to be updated on the project as it develops.

We'll hear much more about this issue and the predictions of our expert at our meeting.

GreenCO: The GreenCO BMP Advisory Committee has produced the first draft ofthe "Best Management
Practices" (BMP's) for Colorado's landscape and nursery industries. The BMP manual will address the best
management practices for areas such as irrigation system design, landscape design, fertilization, and plant
selection criteria. Gree11CO will also focus on public outreach to facilitate the flow of this newly developed
information to their members as well as the general public.

We awarded $25,000 to GreenCO to begin working on the research and development ofthese BMP's.
GreenCO is an umbrella trade organization representing the common interests of nine landscape-related
trades. It has over 2,000 member companies and represents over 36,000 Colorado employees. In 1996,
. GreenCO's Board of Directors established a committee to help GreenCO rnembers respond to threats posed
to the industry by water shortages resulting from drought and growth. Part of this response included the
development of "Best Management Practices" for this industry.

NRLC Summer Conference: The topic of the CU Natural Resource Law Center's 23,d Summer Conference
is "Allocati11g and Managing Water for a Sustainable Future: Lessons from Around the World," More
information and registration materials are available at www.colorado.edu/law/nrlc.

DWR/CWCB/USGS Coordination Meeting: On December 11, 2001, the Directors of the CWCB, DWR
and USGS met to continue their ongoing cooperative efforts to coordinate projects and discuss gaging issues
throughout the State, Projects and issues discussed included: flood hardening of gages; rating curve
extensions; implementation of the CWCB/USGS tracer gage study; real time high and low flow warning
systems; as well as issues related to satellite monitoring and funding. These meetings are held twice a year
in order to improve and enhance the availability of stream gaging data in Colorado,

Education Steering Committee Update: In January, you asked the Colorado Water Congress to suggest
additional members forthe Water Education Foundation steering committee (for a total of 19 members),
The new members are:

· Tom Pointen - SECWCD and Lower Arkansas Water Users
· Kathlee11 Reilley - CDPHE
. Wade Haerle - Xcel Energy

Previously announced members:

.:

Rod Kuharich/Dan McAuliffe - CWCB
Dr. Robert Ward - CSU
Ski Country USA

· Don Hollnrns - Colorado Department of
Education

.

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