WSPC02962

• File Number: 8064
• Description: Indian Water Rights
• State: CO
• Basin: San Juan/Dolores
• Date: 4/4/1986
• Title: Briefing Paper in Support of the Agreement in Principle of March 14, 1986
• Water Supply Pro - Doc Type: Publication

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year. Similarly, under the 1984 Ak-Chin Indian Community Water
Rights Settlement, 98 Statute 269, dealing with the Ak-Chin
Indians in Arizona, the United States committed $10,400,~00 to
acquire water rights required by the settlement, $14,600,000 of
allocated Central Arizona Project construction costs, and
$25,800,000 in small reclamation loans to develop on Reservation
laterals, farm ditches, and other on farm developments. Further,
as in the case of the Papago settlement, the United States
committed itself to prospectively provide annual operation and
maintenance charges for 72,000 acre-feet of water of
approximately $4,800,000 per year.

To conclude, the Agreement in Principle continues a long
standing federal commitment to Indian and non-Indian citizens of
the West to harness the vast resources of the Colorado River.
While the expense to the United States as identified in the
Agreement in Principle is substantial, it is well below federal
obligations undertaken elsewhere on the Colorado River and has
been reduced by significant State, local, and Tribal up-front
financing/cost sharing commitments. Indeed, when Congress' cost
sharing requirement is read together with Congress' 1968 pledge
to promptly build the Animas-La Plata Project (that Congressional
pledge is described above in Part Two), it is apparent that
Congress has imposed on the Secretary of the Interior a mandatory
duty to proceed with the development of the Animas-La Plata
Project once Congress' requirements for reasonable cost sharing
have been met by the parties to the Agreement in Principle.

PART FIVE

The Agreement in Principle extinguishes damage claims
against the United States.

In addition to eliminating the necessity for expensive, time
consuming and disruptive Winters rights litigation, the Agreement
in Principle will avoid substantial damage claims by the two
Tribes and local non-Indian water users against the United
States. The following claims will be foregone if the settlement
agreement is implemented.

A. The Ute Mountain Ute Tribe's Ma~cos Project Claim

In undertaking the development of the Mancos Project, which
involved a significant diversion of direct flow water from the
Mancos River to the Jackson Gulch Reservoir for the benefit of
non-Indian farmers and for the benefit of the United States, in
its capacity as owner and operator of the Mesa Verde National
Park, the United States breached certain duties owed to the Ute
Mountain Ute Indian Tribe. While not obligated to affirmatively
develop all of the water resources which could be utilized by the
Ute Mountain Ute Reservation, the United States, as trustee to
the Ute Mountain Indians, is under a duty not to engage in a
course of conduct which either favors off-reservation non-Indians

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