WSP06607

• File Number: 8029
• Description: Section D General Correspondence - Colorado Agencies
• State: CO
• Basin: Statewide
• Date: 12/1/1960
• Author: Miller and Chutkow
• Title: Report on Ground Water Problems and Recommendations for Further Study and Legislative Consideration
• Water Supply Pro - Doc Type: Report/Study

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EXC.ERPTS FROM THE RECOMMENDA TrONS
OF THE ADVISORY COMMITTEE
ON NATURAL RESOURCES RE
SPECIFIC WATER POLICIES OF THE STATE

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March, 1959

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The Appropriation Doctrine

One of the basic questions propounded to this committee was
the desirability of a re-examination of the appropriation doctrine--
the fundamental basis of Colorado water development. After careful
study, we have concluded that the appropriation doctrine is basically
a good one. It is too deeply imbedded in our fundamental law and in
vested property rights for any sweeping changes to be made. However,
with proper study, certain adjustments can be made in our statutory
system of administering the appropriation doctrine, so as to bring it up
to date and provide an improved system for the development and con-
servation of Colorado 's water resources under modern conditions.

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The State of Colorado should proceed with the development and
conservation of all of its water resources within the general basic frame-
work of the present constitutional doctrine of the appropriation of water
for beneficial use. The state should not attempt to adopt any system of
reservation, by the state, of blocks of unappropriated water for future
beneficial use. Such a system would seriously jeopardize the position
of this state in controversies over the allocation of the use of water of
interstate streams and would undermine the foundations of the appro-
priation doctrine. Conditions in other states which have adopted such
a system are highly dissimilar to conditions in Colorado.

The Department, through its proper agencies, should study and
make recommendations for the enactment of new legislation governing
not only the transfer of the place of diversion, but also transfers of the
place of use and type of use, of water rights in this state under the appro-
priation doctrine, so as to encourage the freer transfer of water rights
and the utilization of new engineering techniques in the storage, trans-
portation, and use of water on the basis of integrated watershed planning.
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Gathering of Data

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Much information on Colorado's water resources and water use
has been gathered by the various state agencies working in this field.