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October 16, 2001 By Janelle Holden After three years of work, the Dolores Water Conservancy District has moved one step closer to completing its plan to buy water from the Montezuma Valley Irrigation Company. On Oct. 9, Don Schwindt, president of the district, sent a signed carriage contract to the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation for approval that would allow DWCD to carry up to 8,000 acre-feet of non-project water through reclamation-owned canals. "It’s a real milestone," Schwindt said at the district’s monthly meeting Thursday. John Porter, the district’s general manager, said the district is expecting a signed approval from the bureau of the $8.2 million expansion within the next 10 days. The final contract resolved three points of contention between the bureau and the district, including leaving silent what the costs might be in 25 years to renew the contract. But a signed carriage contract will only be the first of three hurdles the district needs to cross before any non-project water will be carried. "This carriage contract may have no meaning unless we have some water to move," explained Porter. Negotiating with Montezuma Valley Irrigation Company may prove to be the hardest part of the project, he said. The district is offering MVI $2.25 million for 6,000 acre-feet of water, with the possibility of adding 2,000 acre-feet from the irrigation company’s senior water rights. The $2.25 million would come from a $3.9 million sale of 3,900 acre-feet of project water in 1997 that went to support a fishery pool in the lower Dolores River. "The biggest stumbling block is a limit to their water," explained Porter, who said that even though MVI is not currently using its full allocation of 150,400 acre-feet, in dry years it may use more and thus short other users. "Our concern is if we buy the 6,000 acre-feet from them, we in no way want to injure any other user, whether it be the Ute Mountain Ute full-service irrigation, or the fishery release below the dam, or our own full-service irrigator." "We have decided we don’t need to say anything in the purchase contract about a limit," said Porter, but will push to keep farmers from irrigating Class 6 land — land that is too rocky, steep, salty, or wet for crops. "Our contract says that we shall keep project water off of Class 6 lands," explained Porter, and as punishment for MVI’s use of non-project water on these lands, the district has been reducing its overall water cap by 42 percent of the water used on Class 6 land. Porter said that MVI is arguing that its non-project water shares from the natural flow of the Dolores River, or from Groundhog or Narraguinnep reservoirs, can be used to irrigate Class 6 land, while its project water can go to irrigable land, eventually taking more project water than would have been needed. "You cannot reserve your non-project water for your Class 6 land," Porter argues, while readily admitting MVI disagrees with this. "Before the Dolores Project, a farmer, when it got dry, you didn’t waste your good, precious water on irrigating a rocky hillside, you put that water on your good land, and that was the way the project was planned — that you still do that," explained Porter. Limiting the use of water to good land may be the sticking point in the negotiations, but Porter says there is room to negotiate. "I cannot see them turning down $2.25 million for water they cannot use," said Porter. Once negotiations with MVI are complete, the district then must secure a loan from the Colorado Water Conservation Board to put in $8 million worth of new facilities to carry the water to 3,000 to 4,000 acres of dry land near Pleasant View. The impact of that was studied in the bureau’s environmental assessment of the proposed project. From this, the bureau found that the project would not significantly impact the environment. But many people who commented on the environmental assessment wanted all or a portion of the new water to supplement the fishery pool on the lower Dolores River. The water from MVI is private, the Bureau of Reclamation stated in its finding, and not part of, nor available for, the fishery pool. However, the extra water may benefit rafters. "The 8,000 acre-feet of water involved in the carriage contract has historically been diverted from the Dolores Basin; and during the last 10 years, this occurred at least three times. In years that the water stays in the Dolores Basin, and if runoff conditions cause McPhee Reservoir to spill the following spring, the water can expand the spill and, thus, the rafting period (by up to 4 days)," explained the bureau. Although the bureau stated that the project would have no significant impact on endangered species, last spring the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service issued a biological opinion stating it "would jeopardize the continued existence of the Colorado pikeminnow, razorback sucker, bonytail, or humpback chub, and is likely to destroy or adversely modify the designated critical habitat of these species." However, in order to comply with the study, the district has agreed to contribute $118,000 to a recovery plan that would stock Colorado pikeminnow in the lower Dolores below the Disappointment Creek confluence, and will pay for monitoring selenium accumulation in tributaries of the San Juan River. Also, before a farmer can build an irrigation system on his property, an archaeological assessment must be done, a requirement farmers may resent, but will put up with if it means getting the water. "I only had one farmer that said he would rather not have the water than have an archy (archaeologist) on his land," said Porter. |
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Copyright © 2001 the Cortez
Journal. All rights reserved. |
