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<br />':= <br /> <br /> <br />Winter 2000 <br /> <br /> <br />o <br /> <br />,l.uer~ <br /> <br />A project of the \Vater Education Foundation <br /> <br />FEATURE ARTICLE <br />Will Animas-La Plata Become Reality? <br /> <br />Native American watel' rights have <br />been labeled "the sleeping gianr" within <br />the Colorado River Basin, in part, <br />because some rights have yet to be <br />quamified, In other instances, tribal <br />water rights have been quantified but <br />because of a lack of infrastructure, no <br />water has been delivered (the water exists <br />all "paper" hut is nor "wct"). Also, legal <br />llllcerraimics about whether or not tribes <br />call lease their water off-reservation or <br />out-of-state remain undecided, clouding <br />LIse of their alloGllions. <br />As those connected with the Co!o- <br />rado River know, the politics of the <br />river seldom /low as quickly as its waters. <br />For over 30 years opponents and <br />proponents have waged a bitter battle <br />over Animas-La Plata (ALP) - a water <br />project dl;1t would settle the water rights <br /> <br />claims of two Colorado River Indian <br />Tribes, the Southern Ute Indian and <br />Ute Mountain Ute Tribes. As envi- <br />sioned, the original project, located in <br />the Four Corners area of the Southwest <br />(the intersection of Arizona, New <br />Mexico, Utah and Colorado), would <br />have pumped water OUt of the larger <br />Animas River (with flows averaging <br />720,000 acre-feet annually) and moved <br />it across a divide to the drier La Plata <br />River (averaging 30,000 acre-feet <br />annually) primarily for irrigation, <br />l,vo failed proposals and $67,5 <br />million later, a fourth-generation <br />proposal to meet a 12-year-old water <br />rights settlement with the Colorado <br />Ute tribes hinges on the approval of <br />Congress and federal environmental <br />regulators, <br /> <br />H,R. 3112, sponsored by Congress- <br />man Scott McInnis (R-CO), would <br />allow the federal government to meet <br />contractual obligations on water rights <br />for the Colorado Ute tribes, essentially <br />amending a 1988 congressional act that <br />quantified those water rights. <br />H.R. 3112 is a variation of a 1998 <br />Clinton administration ALP proposal <br />dubbed "Ultra Lite," but there are <br />several discernable differences between <br />the two. While Ultra Lite calls for <br />building a 90,000 acre-feet reservoir <br />(one-third the size of the reservoir in <br />the original proposal) for approximately <br />$160 million, H.R. 3] 12 does not detail <br />a reservoir of specific size, Instead, the <br />bill's supporters chose to wait for the <br />January 2000 release of the Draft <br /> <br />Continued on page 4 <br /> <br />