WSP00170

• File Number: 8210.310.40
• Description: Colorado River Basin Organizations and Entities - Colorado River Water Conservation District - Meeti
• State: CO
• Basin: Western Slope
• Date: 5/3/1988
• Author: CRWCD
• Title: 1937 - 1987 50th Colorado River Water Conservation District
• Water Supply Pro - Doc Type: Project Overview

It should be noted that the River District filed on and maintain-
ed diligence on decrees that eventually built the Curecanti Unit.
Most of the right, title, interest, claim and priority of the
District's conditional decrees were assigned to the Department of
the Interior. Bureau of Reclamation, builder and operator of the
Curecanti Unit.
Today. the Curecanti, renamed the Wayne N. Aspinall Unit as
a memorial to Colorado's Congressman of 24 years specializing in
natural resource legislation. is indeed appreciated by the people
of Gunnison County for the economic benefits afforded the
region. (The Curecanti Unit includes three reservoirs and power
plants, Blue Mesa, Morrow Point and Crystal in a 35-mile stretch
of the river below the town of Gunnison.)
The River District board and staff were active in seeking con-
gressional approval for Curecanti in support of the Colorado
River Storage Project Act of 1956 authorizing construction by
the Bureau of Reclamation of four major reservoirs in the Upper
Colorado River Basin: Curecanti, Flaming Gorge, Navajo and
Glen Canyon. These projects were to regulate river flow, store
water for beneficial use consistant with the many compacts and
laws controlling the river. generate hydroelectric power and
reclaim arid and semiarid lands.
Authorization in the 1956 Act was also given to the Secretary
of the Interior to construct. operate and maintain several par-
ticipating projects in Colorado. .. Paonia, Silt and Smith Fork.
Most major reservoirs built in Western Colorado, though built
by the Bureau of Reclamation, were built upon water decrees
that the District filed on and maintained required diligence.
Filing for the storage right in water courts is the necessary
first step to all other activities leading up to eventual construc-
tion of a project. An historic practice of the River District has
been to file on good reservoir sites to obtain w hat will become a
senior water right and insurance for the future use of that water
to benefit the West Slope.

ADDRESSING
SOME IMPORTANT ISSUES

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lertainlY in the early years, the Colorado River District. Con-
servancy Districts, Bureau of Reclamation and others could not
envision the many environmental laws that would entangle their
efforts to apply water to beneficial use within just a couple of
decades. So it is easily understood why the board would react
rather than act when the District's first secretary-engineer,
Frank Merrill. reported on an alarming problem he saw develop-
ing with the Issac Walton League. The League, because of en-
vironmental concerns, he said, was leading a fight to prevent con-
struction of reservoirs on certain streams. the Gunnison River
being one of them. If the League was to be successful in their bid
to stop projects. Merrill told the board, there would be little use
in planning local projects.
In retrospect, it was the Colorado River District and its
predecessor, the Protective Association, that served as pioneers
in environmental protection in Colorado and in federal reclama-
tion. Protection of fisheries and scenic attractions had high priori-
ty with the River District board practically from day one. For eJC:-
ample, at West Slope insistence, protection for fishing streams
was written into Senate Document 80 governing the operation of
the Coloradl>-Big Thompson transmountain diver'sion. Along with
other protective features, there were required minimum flows to
protect the environment to a reasonable degree in streams in-
vol..ed in the diversion. The same principles were applied to the
Fry-Ark agreement.
On one occasion, it's recorded that Frank Delaney counseled
the board that "fishery protection should be a major goal" of the
District. This pioneering effort of the District has been
unrecognized and unappreciated by the environmental communi-
ty through the years.
The formation of a "super district" taking in all of Western Col-
orado was proposed once upon a time but was successfully oppo~-
ed by the River District. Origin of the scheme is not documented,
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