Hello Sublette County, I am sure you have

heard the phrase, “Whiskey is for drinking and

water is for fighting.”

During the month of June, I attended two

conferences dealing with water shortages in

the Colorado River and its tributaries. One

conference was hosted in Boulder, Colo., at

the University of Colorado’s Law School and

the other was in Salt Lake City at Utah’s Department

of Natural Resources. The Colorado

River Basin has experienced persistently dry

hydrology since the turn of the 21st Century

while many of the metropolitan areas that

utilize the basin’s water have seen incredible

growth. Denver, Salt Lake, Phoenix and Las

Vegas are some of the fastest growing cities

in the nation.

How we balance this exponential population

growth with a shrinking water resource,

the Colorado River, will be one of the great

challenges of the next 50 years. Historically,

agriculture has controlled the vast majority

of water rights on the Colorado River. However,

in many areas that are seeing increased

demand for municipal and industrial uses of

water, agricultural users of water are under increased

pressure to either sell water or curtail

use. This is not just a fight between agriculture,

municipalities and industrial water users, but is

also a fight between the Upper Basin states ¬

Wyoming, Colorado, Utah, New Mexico and a

small piece of Arizona – and the Lower Basin

states – Nevada, the bulk of Arizona and California.

The Colorado River and its tributaries

provide water for about 40 million people and

more than 5.5 million acres of farmland from

Wyoming to California.

History

The fight over Colorado River water has

been going on longer than 100 years. In fact,

in 1919 the rapidly expanding use of Colorado

River water in California was viewed with increasing

alarm by officials in the four Upper

Basin states. As a consequence, the League

of the Southwest was formed in 1919 to promote

the orderly development and equitable

division of Colorado River water. Congress

approved the Kincaid Act in 1920, which directed

the Secretary of the Interior to make a

full and comprehensive study and to report

on the possible diversion and use of Colorado

River water.

As a result of negotiations among the seven

Basin States, it was agreed that an interstate

compact would establish an equitable apportionment

of the waters and protect the Upper

Basin states. Each of the seven Basin states

adopted the authorizing legislation in 1921

and Congress consented to the negotiations by

legislation enacted on Aug. 19, 1921. The Colorado

River Commission convened in January

1922. After 27 meetings, a final agreement on

the Compact was signed in Santa Fe, N.M., on

Nov. 24, 1922. By 1944, the state legislatures

of all seven Basin states had ratified the compact.

This final agreement also included language

that the Upper and Lower Basin states

would equally share any water shortage resulting

from treaty obligations to Mexico.

So, why are we still fighting 100 years

later? After all, we have a virtually watertight

agreement between all of the states and the

federal government. The answer is that poor

assumptions were made regarding projected

flows of the Colorado River. These early studies

occurred during a wet cycle, which we now

understand better due to tree ring studies. For

the two decades proceeding 1922, the Colorado

River had produced an average flow that

would have accommodated 16-million acrefeet

per year in consumptive use of water annually

for the two basins. However, the Upper

Basin by virtue of the compact assumed the

burden of drier cycles. Hence the Lower Basin

has received a guaranteed 10-year cumulative

minimum flow of 75-million acre-feet at Lee’s

Ferry, located just below Lake Powell. The

Upper Basin became a guarantor in the sense

that its depletions may not reduce the 10-year

aggregate flow below the 75-million acre-feet

at the Lee Ferry compact point.

Drought years

Modern tree ring studies have revealed that

the three decades prior to 1922 were likely the

wettest in the past 500 to 1,200 years and that

the natural longterm annual flow past Lee’s

Ferry would accommodate only 13.5-million

acre-feet of consumptive use. The Lower Basin

and Mexico are estimated to utilize between

1.2-million to 1.5-million acre-feet of water

per year more than the river flows on average

in today’s drier conditions. Hence, the Lower

Basin states have a recognized structural deficit

and consequently, to meet demands, the

basin’s reservoirs have been drawn down by

about 30-million acre-feet. If drought conditions

continue, Lake Powell could drop below

the elevation necessary to produce power. So,

the Lower Basin states are utilizing more water

than they are allocated, and drier conditions

threaten the Upper Basin states’ ability to provide

the required amount of water below Lake

Powell.

If the Upper Basin states cannot provide

75-million acre-feet of water for the previous

10-year period, then compact requirements are

tripped that would require a curtailment of use

in the Upper Basin. All post-1922 water rights

could be subject to curtailment. Curtailment

will have a greater impact on municipalities

and industrial users than agricultural users,

because agriculture has most of the pre-1922

water rights. However, agriculture will be

heavily impacted as well.

Drought strategies

In May 2005, the Secretary of the Interior

directed the Department of Reclamation to

develop additional strategies for improving

management of the reservoirs of the Colorado

River system. In response, Reclamation initiated

a public process to develop and adopt interim

operational guidelines that can be used

to address the operations of Lake Powell and

Lake Mead during drought and low reservoir

conditions. These interim guidelines are in effect

until 2026. About 2014, the major water

suppliers in the Lower Basin entered into a

Pilot Drought Response memorandum of understanding

with the Department of the Interior.

Many of these same parties joined with

Denver Water in the Upper Basin to implement

a conservation pilot program designed to fund

water conservation. Some ranchers in Sublette

County have utilized this program, which paid

them to turn off their water after a set date and

then not put water back on their fields until the

next spring. This program was somewhat contentious

among irrigators in Sublette County,

with supporters and detractors.

Beginning in 2014, the Upper and Lower

Basin states began working on a drought

contingency plan to address shortages. The

seven Colorado River Basin states, in partnership

with the Department of Interior, recently

signed the Colorado River Drought Contingency

Plan. One part of particular importance

to the Upper Basin states of Colorado, New

Mexico, Utah and Wyoming is the Demand

Management Storage Agreement. The DMSA

authorizes the Bureau of Reclamation to make

available to the states unfilled storage capacity

at the initial units of the Colorado River Storage

Project Act – Powell, Navajo, the Aspinall

Unit and Flaming Gorge. The DMSA neither

establishes nor mandates the development of a

demand management program. Storage would

become available only if the states were able

to design and implement a DM program in the

Upper Basin. If the states do establish a DM

program, the agreement allows for storage of

up to 500,000 acre-feet of water conserved in

the Upper Colorado River Basin, which will

help assure compliance with the 1922 Colorado

River Compact.

According to the Wyoming State Engineer’s

Office, the states are working to identify

priority issues that will need to be developed

to inform a thorough evaluation regarding

the feasibility of a demand management program.

A critical component of that evaluation

is engagement with water users and other interested

parties of the Green and Little Snake

river basins of Wyoming. Beginning later this

summer, we will begin focused discussions on

demand management throughout the respective

basins in Wyoming.

Conferences

The conferences that I have attended are

helping me become more educated on Colorado

River issues and it is imperative that all

water users in the Green River Basin, which

is everyone, become engaged in the discussions

around a demand management program.

I remain unconvinced that Wyoming should

participate in a demand management program,

since we are not utilizing the 14 percent share

of water we were allocated in the 1948 Upper

Colorado River Basin Compact.

However, I am keeping an open mind, because

I worry about the old adage that Dan

Budd often repeated: “Water flows to money.”

I worry about drying up agriculture to wet

the whistle of Denver, Salt Lake City, Phoenix

and Las Vegas. Everyone who likes to fish,

feed hay or drink water in the Green River

Valley had better pay attention.