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I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I 1.4 History and Background The Ute Mountain Ute Reservation is located within t~e States of eolorado, New Mexico, and Utah. The Colorado portion of the reservation includes approximately 800 square miles of the southwestern corner of the State. The land varies from mountainous regions to nearly desert-like terrain. The Town of Towaoc houses approximately 90 percent of the Tribe's on-reservation population. A portion of the Town's current water supply comes from springs located on the west side of Sleeping Ute Mountain, uphill and to the north of Towaoc. Most of the Towaoc water supply is obtai ned from water del i vered through the Montezuma Vall ey Irri gati on Company System, whi ch conveys water di verted from the Oolores Ri ver. There is a storage reservoi r at the end of the Rocky Ford Oitch from which the Tribe diverts the water allowed by their ownership share in the company. This supply must be ponded, settled, filtered, chlorinated, and pumped to a storage tank located above Towaoc. Ouri ng the 1950' s through the 1970' s, the Uni ted States Bureau of Rec1 amati on (Bureaul planned and authorized the no10res Project to provide irriqation, municipal, and industrial water sllpp1ies for the southwestern region of the state. Appendix II. contai ns copi es of the Bureau's eortez- Towaoc Pi pel i ne Feasibility Oesign and Estil'late, September 1975, and excerpts of the Oolores Project'nefinite Plan Report (OPRI, April 1977, covering the proposed pipeline. The project plans included provisions for delivering no10res River water regu1 ated by McPhee Oam and Reservoi r, to the Ci ty of Cortez and Town of Towaoc. Water allocations were made of 6200 acre-feet per year to Cortez and 1000 acre-feet per year to Towaoc. The Bureau's updated OPR of the Oolores Project in 1980 included a Cortez-Towaoc pipeline to deliver the annual allocations. Based on the Bureau's cost estimates and project repayment provisions for municipalities, agreement could not be reached with the eity of Cortez or the Tribe to have the Bureau construct the vater supply pipelines. In the early 1980's the City of Cortez applied to the CWCB for long-term financing to build the necessary pipeline from the Oolores Canal to the Cortez water treatment plant, a distance of approximately 3.5 miles. Construction of 1-4 1040C