Aspen Times Letter to the editor from CTU President Ken Neubecker.
http://www.aspentimes.com/article/20081030/LETTER/810299947/1020&title=52:%20Perpetual%20pork
PAWSD vs TU, Round Four
Pagosa Daily Post Glenn Walsh | 10/30/08
Monday afternoon, Andrew Peternell, director of the Colorado Water Project for Trout Unlimited, filed an appeal of Judge Gregory Lyman’s September 11 judgment awarding the Pagosa Area Water and Sanitation District and the San Juan Water Conservancy District an additional water storage right of 19,000 acre feet for their Dry Gulch Reservoir project and the right to pump water from the San Juan River at the rate of 150 cubic feet per second.
PAWSD presently has the right to divert 6300 acre feet of water from the San Juan River for storage and to pump 6.9 cubic feet per second from the river to its Snowball treatment facility. The 150 cfs grant in Lyman’s decision represents a more than twenty-fold increase. Significantly, the 150 cfs right is 700% larger than the right the water districts’ engineer Steve Harris claimed was necessary to meet 2040 demand in his initially engineering report for the Dry Gulch reservoir.
Trout Unlimited Appeals Dry Gulch Decision
Pagosa Daily Post Sheila Berger | 10/29/08
The Appeal is based upon three issues: the reasonableness of a 50-year planning horizon, whether the 50-year population projections can be substantiated based upon a normal rate of growth, and whether the applicants sufficiently demonstrated that the decreed amount of water is reasonably necessary to serve this projected population.
http://gmc.websitewelcome.com/~ownpcom/pagosadailypost.php?mode=viewnews&id=10231&cat=1
Time for truth about two amendments
"A no vote on 58 benefits only the wildly profitable energy industry. Voting yes assists various important state programs, not least its wildlife...."
"A long list of organizations that includes every major wildlife organization, the Farm Bureau, Colorado Forum, Colorado Center on Law and Policy and virtually every water conservancy districts on both sides of the Continental Divide oppose Amendment 52."
Water groups decry Amendment 52
The ballot measure would divert funds to highway projects.
Diversions
The Windy Gap water diversion project would deal a major blow to a portion of the Colorado River that is already struggling to survive.
Article Last Updated: 10/26/2008
The Northern Colorado Water Conservancy District hopes to divert as much of its 30,000 acre-feet of water as possible from the Colorado River every year to the East Slope. Northern proposes building a reservoir near Carter Lake for storing Windy Gap water to serve cities like Loveland, Greeley, Fort Lupton, Broomfield and Longmont.
With about 60 percent of the upper Colorado already being diverted by Northern and Denver Water, this project would take another 20 percent of a river struggling to survive. When you dry up the rivers, you dry up a majority of our tourism industry and our economy. You dry up the reason anglers, rafters, kayakers, birders and picnickers spend their vacations in Colorado. You dry up critical riparian habitat, which makes up 2 percent of Colorado land yet supports 98 percent of its wildlife.
Roan Fight Stays Alive
From CTU
The fight for protection of the Roan Plateau continues, with some good news to report from recent weeks. You may recall that in September, the Bureau of Land Management issued leases for the public lands on the Roan Plateau, and dismissed over 15,000 protests filed by concerned parties ranging from local citizens to the State of Colorado. On the same day, a team of sportsmen, recreation and conservation groups filed for an injunction in federal court to prevent full-scale drilling of the Roan Plateau and protect its important natural values as they are today.
Last Friday, all parties involved, including the Bureau of Land Management and the oil and gas companies holding the new leases on the Roan, agreed to a ban on surface disturbance on the Roan Plateau until June 2009. This ensures that the concerns expressed in our litigation will be heard and carefully considered before any development will be contemplated.
Wildlife Conservation Groups Announce Opposition to Amendment 52
Two of Colorado’s leading wildlife conservation groups, concerned about the future of the state’s natural resources, are strongly opposing Amendment 52 because it would siphon money from water management and wildlife habitat protection.
“This amendment would gut funding for some of our state’s most critical issues including water conservation and development, wildlife protection and work underway to reduce the risk of catastrophic fire in the High Country,” said Suzanne O’Neill, executive director of the Colorado Wildlife Federation.
Amendment 52 would take tax money Colorado now receives from a relatively modest severance tax on the production of oil and gas and target it for highway expansion with particular focus on Interstate 70. The Amendment would reduce successful state efforts to sustain the state’s irreplaceable clean water, air, forests and native wildlife species.
“It appears that the sponsors of this legislation are intent on setting Colorado back for years with a measure that would devastate the state’s Species Conservation Trust Fund and jeopardize the natural resources that define our Western heritage and way of life,” O’Neill said.
Ken Neubecker, president of Colorado Trout Unlimited, said the Amendment would directly threaten the future health of Colorado streams by eliminating needed money for water management and setting the stage for forest fires that would severely damage streams.
“It is shocking that any Coloradans who care about our state’s natural resources and the sustainable economies that depend on healthy wildlife habitat could devise such an onerous measure,” Neubecker said. “Amendment 52 is nothing more than plain, old-fashioned highway robbery.
“And the measure would be a constitutional amendment that locks money now used for water, wildlife and forest management into a fund that legislators could use or abuse as they wish,” he said.
If approved Amendment 52 would:
- Take money away from efforts to minimize the impact of the mountain pine beetle epidemic killing millions of trees and increasing the risk of forest fires around mountain communities.
- Take money away from new water projects that Colorado’s cities and farms are relying on for future prosperity.
- Take money from efforts to stop the spread of invasive species such as the zebra mussel now invading state reservoirs and lakes.
- Take money away from energy assistance program for low-income Coloradans.
“Instead of gimmicks clearly designed to undercut wildlife conservation efforts, legislators should come together to support the work of our wildlife managers, just as the legislature did last year when they unanimously approved the Colorado Habitat Stewardship Act,” Neubecker said.
CONTACT: Suzanne O’Neill
CWF (303) 919-3949
Ken Neubecker
TU (970) 376-1918
Citizen's Guide to Colorado Climate Change
Published by the Colorado Foundation for Water Education - view free or purchase
"Climate Scientists Brad Udall and Nolan Doesken, along with several other experts, explore the possible impacts of climate change on water supply, recreation, agriculture and environmental health in Colorado."(with thanks to Coyote Gulch)
Amend. 52 is not the right solution on roads
Opinion by Ron Teck, former state senator representing Mesa County
During my eight years in the state Senate, I became convinced that we should not put spending mandates into the state Constitution. We are faced with this bad idea again this year with Amendment 52....
http://www.gjsentinel.com/hp/content/news/opinion/stories/2008/10/21/102208_4A_Teck_column.html
