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7/1(' (ity (~(f)!tIllJlgo UJouM bt'llefit from building ALP - ({bout 2,600 {{rre-fiN annually blll the majority would be pumped another JJO fi.'ct over a divide hct\"/cen the Animas ;IIH.I La PLU;1 rivers. From there. the water v'iOuld be diverted mostly 1.0 Eumlands, the Ute MOlllllain Ute n.:servarioll, and a smalltT restTvoir on 1 he SOLI them Ute Indian Reservatioll. About 60 percent of the \vatu would he llsed ftH irrig;nion (l'nough for over 70.000 acres orland) and {he remainder for M&I uses, Icngd1Y and costly litigation to quantify w;\ter rights for the tribes was prevented, The 1988 Water Rights Settlement Act guaranteed that by the year 2000: . the Ute Moulltain Ute Tribe would gain 6,000 acre-feet of M&I water :ltld 26,300 acre-feet of irrigation water for claims on the two 'There is one bit of solvation for the farmers on the Animas and La Plata rivers and that is an Indian water rights settlement." - Philip Mutz, Upper Colorado River Commissioner for New Mexico ["Ivers; . the Southern Ute Indian Tribe would receive 26,500 acre-feet of I\If&1 water and 3,400 acre feet of irrigation water for its reserved >"vater rights claims 011 the tWO rivers and; . all 62,200 acre-fecl of depletions would be delivered through ALP. Ho\vcver, the d:nc has now passed for delivery of the water to the Colorado Utes, opening up {he possibility for litigation by the Colorado Ute tribes, The Changed Face of ALP 1988 Water Rights Settlement Act r\ pinnacle mOl1lenr in the history of ALP came in 1986 whell the trihes elHcrcd into negotiations with tht' federal govcrnmclH during the Reagan ;,dministration to st'nle Colorado Ute warer rights claims on the La Plata River, Animas River and sever;ll other San Juan lhsin streams. As a result of signing the Colorado Ute Indian Water Rights Final Sett]clncnt Agreelllcnt, potentially Costs Obtaining funding for ALP became a challenge and one that has continued to 8 . ClHORAI)() RIVER PROIECT . RIVER REPORT. \'{lINTER 2000 haunt the project throughout its various incarnations. IVbny attribute the inability to get the congressional appropriations needed to fund the project to its large price tag, The 1979 COSt for the project was around $326 million, Because of inflation, br 1988, the (Otal COSt of the projeG had bal- looned to $512 million (though some of the cOStS would have been supported through a cosr-sharing program), A ] 996 report by the Inspecwr General also determined that ALP returned 32- cents t()[' every taxpayer dollar spent on the project. a flllding that roused criticism from national taxpayer groups, If the full-scale original project would have been built in 1998, it was estimated to have cost approximately $744 million. Environment Environment~lt regulations, as well as heighrened legal opposition from groups suing to block ALP under the CWA and NEPA, proved to be inOuential in altering the shape of the project. in 1979, rhe V,S, Fish & Wildlife Setvice (USFWS) issued a biologicll opinion on ALP under the Section 7 of the Endangered Species An (ESA), an environmental review process required of all federal water proje'cts before construction is allowed to begin. Despite knovvledge of endangered species (Colorado pikeminnmv) in rhe river, the opinion indicated the project did not jeopardize the fIsh, The USPWS lInding cleared the way for the Environmcnral Impact Statement (EIS) in 1980 and the quest f()!' congressional appropriations for {he project so construction could be'gin, However, discovery of greater numbers and types of endangered fish (Colorado pikeminnow and razorback sucker) in rhe San Juan River by scientists in the late Eighties prompted USF\X1S to reconsider the non-jeopardy opinion issued back in 1979. In 1991, USF\X1S reversed its "no jeopardy" opinion of ALP, requiring rhe 1980 EIS to be revised to include provisions for protecting rhe endangered