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<br />000890 <br /> <br />and environmentalists, who believed more water should be protected to benefit the endangered <br />fish. <br /> <br />Controversy emerged quickly, particularly over the recovery flows. Water users on both <br />sides of the Continental Divide weTe concerned that the Recovery Program had placed too much <br />emphasis on protection of stream flows and that other activities, such as controlling non-native <br />species and stocking of the endangeTed species, have not been given adequate attention. <br />Additionally, East and West slope water users disagreed about how future water development <br />would be apportioned. <br />Because the Recovery Progranl operates on consensus anlOng all pTogram participants, <br />the lack ofa unified position among water users threatened to stalemate the program's progress. <br />In response, the Department of Natural Resources convened an intensive series of meetings <br />beginning in October 1997 to resolve conflicts among water USeTS and other program <br />participants. Those meetings still appear to be productive and are continuing. The participants <br />in these discussions are seeking a new way to reconcile future wateT development with fish <br />protection for the ColoTado River (as an alternative to the state's water rights applications). The <br />new approach places greater emphasis on voluntary operational changes in existing facilities and <br />contract deliveries of water. These discussions also seek protection for existing water supplies <br />and future opportunities to develop up to 120,000 aCTe-feet. <br />The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) is expected to release a draft programmatic <br />biological opinion that embodies this new approach in mid-February. Opponents of the instream <br />flow water rights argued that this new approach will rendeT the instream flow applications <br />unnecessary. Though most of the speakers at Thursday's meeting agreed, some were hesitant to <br />support withdrawal of all applications until all Recovery Program participants are satisfied with <br />the biological opinion and agree to remove the instream flow filing requirement from the <br />Recovery Program's recovery action plan. Others expressed concern that no alternative has been <br />proposed as a substitute for instream flow filings for the Yampa River. <br />The recovery program is a partnership created in 1988 among the states of Colorado, <br />Wyoming and Utah, the USFWS, the Bureau of Reclamation, the Western Area Power <br />Administration, environmental groups and water development interests. The program's goal is <br />to re-establish self-sustaining populations of the pikeminnow (formerly known as the Colorado <br />