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Appendix I Background on and Overview of the Anlmu-La Plata Project In 1938, the Bureau began studying the feasibility of transferring water from the Animas River to the La Plata River basin. In 1966, the Bureau prepared a feasibility report for the project, which was subsequently authorized through the Colorado River Basin Project Act of 1968. In 1976, the United States filed a lawsuit on behalf of the Southern Ute and Ute Mountain Ute Indian tribes to identify and obtain (Le., "quantify") their rights to water flowing in several rivers on or near their reselVations, including the Animas and La Plata rivers. The State Engineer of Colorado, projecting the impact of the Ute Indians' claims on non-Indian water users, determined that the tribes' claims could have a severe impact on these users. For example, he believed that during years of water shortage, the tribes could have rights to virtually all the available water in numerous streams and rivers in the San Juan River basin. Because land ownership on the Southern Ute Reservation was mixed, with non-Indians owning and farming land along the La Plata River, these legal proceedings created a great deal of tension between the Southern Utes and local non-Indians. To avoid an expensive and disruptive outcome, the tribes, local communities, non-Indian irrigators, state of Colorado, and federal government negotiated a settlement of the tribes' claims. In 1988, the Colorado Ute Indian Water Rights Settlement Act (p.L. 100-585) made the Animas-La Plata project the cornerstone of this negotiated settlement of the Utes' water rights claims.3 (App. IT provides information on the 1988 Settlement Act.) In 1979, the Service had issued a biological opinion concerning the potential effects of the proposed Animas-La Plata project on the endangered Colorado squawfish. (App. ill provides information on requirements under the Endangered Species Act and on the Colorado squawfish.) At that time, on the basis of the capture of a single juvenile Colorado squawfish in the San Juan River, the Service concluded because of its "already tenuous hold on survival, its possible loss should have little impact on . . . the species itself." However, the Service recommended that the Bureau thoroughly survey the native fish populations of the San Juan River and determine the environmental needs of the squawfish. Surveys of fisheries conducted from 1987 to 1989 discovered more Colorado squawfish than had previously been known and revealed potential effects of the project that had not been considered in the Service's 1979 biological opinion. 'The Ute Mountain Ute Indian Tribe also has the right to receive water from the Dolores Prqject, another Bureau project in Colorado. Page 10 GAOIRCED-96-1 Anlmae-La Plata Project