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<br />000883 <br /> <br />News Release <br /> <br />February 1, 1999 <br />For Immediate Release <br /> <br />News contact: <br /> <br />Peter Evans <br />303-866-3441 <br /> <br />WATER RIGHT FILINGS FOR ENDANGERED FISH WITHDRAWN <br /> <br />The Colorado Water Conservation Board voted on Thursday, Jan. 28, to withdraw two <br />applications for instTeam flow water rights that were designed to protect runoff in the Colorado <br />and Yampa rivers to help recover four fish species pTotected undeT the federal Endangered <br />Species Act (ESA). At the same time, however, the Board decided to retain two otheT <br />applications for year-round base flows fOT the same two river segments. <br />The Board's vote came after almost two hOUTS of public testimony and debate over <br />several options that ranged from the withdrawal of all four applications to keeping all fOUT <br />applications. Henry Maddux, director of the Upper Colorado River Endangered Fish Recovery <br />Program, presented the Recovery Program's request that the Board retain all four applications. <br />The Board filed the applications in December 1995, following mOTe than two years of <br />technical studies and public meetings, to fulfill the state's eommitment to pennanently protect <br />stTeam flows needed by the fish undeT the multi-state, multi-jurisdictional Upper ColoTado <br />Endangered Fish Recovery PTogram. The base flows were designed to assure that some water <br />would Temain in the streams at all times in the so-called "IS-Mile Reach" of the Colorado River, <br />which runs between Palisade and the riveT'S confluence with the Gunnison, and in the Yampa <br />River between the confluence with the Williams Fork (near the Town of Craig) and the <br />confluence with the Little Snake RiveT, The laTger "recovery flow" filings would have allowed a <br />substantial meaSUTe of water in each river fOT future and protected all the remaining water not <br />now in use in those reaches. In 1995, these water rights applications were viewed as a <br />compromise between water users, who would have preferred larger set-asides fOT development, <br />