Laserfiche WebLink
<br />. <br /> <br />16 <br /> <br />could serve some purpose in specific or last resort situations, it <br />might not assure protection of all wilderness features. <br /> <br />It may be that some discrete future use may be made which will not <br />cause a noticeable effect on or otherwise diminish wilderness <br />characteristics. Without knowing the specific amounts or forms of <br />these potential water uses or the probability of implementation, the <br />quantification of a precise wilderness right is impractical and not <br />particularly useful. <br /> <br />It is for these reasons, that the Forest Service has determined that <br />assertion of reserved rights claims does not always present as <br />practical and effective means of protecting wilderness values as it <br />does for other NFS resources and thus it must be used selectively <br />after careful consideration of the specific facts of a particular <br />situation. <br /> <br />Application in Colorado: As previously discussed, analysis of the <br />existing absolute and conditional water rights located in or above the <br />24 wilderness areas in Colorado named in the Second Amended Complaint <br />indicates that all of the rights are senior to the various designation <br />dates of these wilderness areas with five exceptions. The five rights <br />that are junior to the wilderness designation dates are, by their <br />having been adjudicated and entered in decrees, senior in priority to <br />any Federal reserved water right that the United States could acquire <br />by filing claims for such rights at this time. The Forest Service has <br />concluded that no reserved or other water right would be effective in <br />protecting any of the 24 wilderness areas at issue from the effects of <br />any of the existing decreed absolute or conditional water rights. <br /> <br />This is not to say, however, that protection is not available to <br />counter any adverse effect any of the existing decreed conditional <br />water rights might produce on a given wilderness area. The President <br />must approve, pursuant to the conditions in section 4(d)(4) of the <br />Wilderness Act, 16 U.S.C. 1133(d)(4), the construction or other <br />activity necessary to perfect those conditional rights located on NFS <br />land within a wilderness area. The Forest Service will make a <br />recommendation concerning such a proposal, through the Secretary, to <br />the President. Likewise, the development of water resources related <br />to the perfection of any conditional water right on NFS lands outside <br />of wilderness is subject to the administrative control of the Forest <br />Service. <br /> <br />Moreover, if anyone sought to change one of these water rights, the <br />Forest Service could, as explained in Federal Defendants' Brief in <br />Opposition to Sierra Club's Motion for Partial Summary Judgment at 8, <br />10-11 (filed February 12, 1<)87), and more fully in Defendant- <br />Intervenors Brief in opposition to Sierra Club's Motion for Partial <br />Summary Judgment at 4-5 (filed February 6, 1987), consider asserting <br />