WSP01231

• File Number: 8443
• Description: Narrows Unit
• State: CO
• Basin: South Platte
• Water Division: 1
• Date: 2/27/1976
• Author: Jim Ohi
• Title: Report to the Land Use Commission on the Narrows Project
• Water Supply Pro - Doc Type: Report/Study

. ,

REPORT TO THE LAND USE COMMISSION
ON THE NARROWS PROJECT

OOOi

February 27, 1976
by Jim Ohi

Mr. Chairman, I would like to report to the Commission on the Narrows
project by using the same format of my report on the proposed Pawnee
plant. First, I will report briefly on staff activities concerning
the project since the Commission meeting of last month. The body of
my report will consist of five major parts: a description of the
project; the current status of the project in the state, local and
federal review processes; the major issues concerning the project;
state policy questions and considerations implicit in the project;
and, finally, a staff request for further review of the proposal.

I will begin with a brief description of staff activities concerned
with the project subsequent to the Commission's January 23rd meeting.
Following the Commission's action on the 23rd, I began to review the
draft environmental report statement prepared by the Bureau of
Reclamation for the project. On Monday, January 26, Mr. Savage met
with Fred Daubert, Chief of the Project Planning and Construction
Section of the Colorado Water Conservation Board, and discussed the
role, scope and purpose of the Land Use Commission's review of the
Narrows project. Subsequent to this meeting on January 29, Mr. Daubert
sent a memo on the project to Mr. Savage. Also, on January 26, Wil
Ulman met with Gary Friehauf, Secretary-Manager of the Lower South
Platte Water Conservancy District, and discussed the role, scope and
purpose of the Land Use Commission's review. On January 29, Mr. Savage
sent a letter to Governor Lamm, as requested by the Commission, out-
lining the several resolutions passed by the Commission at the
January 23 meeting. On February 17, wil Ulman, Jim Kurtz-Phelan and
I, along with Dave Carlson of the State Department of Agriculture,
went to Ft. Morgan to meet with the Morgan County Board of County
Commissioners and staff members, and J.K. Smith of Colorado Counties, Inc.
During the meeting, I summarized LUC staff activities concerning the
Narrows project and the Pawnee plant and described what technical
assistance LUC staff might be able to provide. That afternoon, the
staff and Mr. Carlson made a visual inspection of the site for the
proposed Pawnee plant and the site for the proposed Narrows dam, as
well as the valley which the dam will inundate.

I will now describe the'major features of the project.

1. Purpose--the purpose of the project is to store high
runoff and flood flows for:

(a) supplemental irrigation water for 287,000 acres within
the Central Colorado Water Conservancy District and"the Lower
South Platte Water Conservancy District (LSPWCD);

(b) flood control, recreation, fish and wildlife uses;
and

(c) future municipal and industrial water supplies.