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to <br />_. <br /> <br />y'1Ll <br />1 11.... ~,i, <br /> <br />January 12, 2006 <br />Ken Jacobson <br />US Army Corp of Engineers <br />Gunnison Basin Regulatory Office <br />400 Rood Ave., Room 142 <br />Grand Junction, CO 8]501-2563 <br />Dear Mr. Jacobson: <br />My name is Steve Baker. I own a small gravel operation in Moffat County. I <br />started in September 2001. <br />You may recall that I spoke with you a couple of times about my situation up <br />here. I started my business as a 9.99 acre permit from the MLRB in Denver. Upon <br />establishing our market and operating the required two years as a 110 operation, I applied <br />for a permit expansion to take in the rest of my property. <br />During the permit expansion process Nathan Green was contacted and came to <br />our site. In a meeting between Nathan and myself on the property in October 2003, <br />Nathan informed me that there were cattails and other vegetation that indicated the Corp <br />had jurisdiction. I told Nathan that we did a survey of the property in 2001 before <br />applying for the mine permit and located cattails at that time (Shown in exhibit "A" and <br />"D") wich was a considerably smaller area than was currently in the field now and that <br />we irrigate the pastwe for horses. He was not interested in my survey. He said that if the <br />property had water, vegetation and the right color of soil, he considered it a wetland. I <br />informed Nathan that the only water this property had on it was the imgation water that I <br />was currently pumping onto it (Please see exhibit "E") and had been pumping on it for <br />the last three years. Nathan said I would have to redirect my water and it would probably <br />take two years for the vegetation to go away. In May of 2005 I spent $3000 in pump <br />upgrades to channel my water through a pipe to a stockwater pond in order to comply <br />with Nathans request to redirect my water in order to allow the natural vegetation to <br />grow. I met with Nathan several more times and tried to explain that none of the <br />vegetation he was concerned about was present in the pasture before operations began <br />(please see exhibit "B"), and none would be present if the irrigation water was removed, <br />and by his own manual this would be a "man-induced wetland" and not considered <br />jurisdictional (please see exhibit "C"). I suggested we wme to a reasonable <br />