States dive into talks over Colorado River cutbacks

Monday, Dec. 20, 2004 | 11:08 a.m.

Representatives from seven Colorado River basin states met Friday to discuss ways to cut use of water from the river, which is used by more than 25 million people and on 3.5 million acres of crops throughout the West.

The work by representatives of the seven states and their water agencies has been ongoing since March, when the federal Interior Department -- the rivermaster for the three lower basin states of Nevada, Arizona and California -- warned that drought-induced cutbacks could be necessary. The Interior Department and the Bureau of Reclamation, which manages the river and lakes Powell and Mead, have no plan in place for the cutbacks from basic allocations from the river.

Friday morning, Interior Deputy Secretary Steve Griles warned the states that they have until April to come up with recommendations on how to impose cuts or Secretary Gale Norton would develop and impose the feds' own plan.

Kay Brothers, Southern Nevada Water Authority deputy general manager, said the basin states' representatives worked for about four hours Friday. No breakthrough was expected or delivered, but Brothers said the technical group has decided to meet formally twice more before April 1 and continue meeting through conference calls and other media.

"We kind of set up a road map of how we can come up with what they (the federal regulators) want from us," she said.

Brothers said Nevada could ultimately take a 4 percent to 6 percent cut to the state's basic allocation of 300,000 acre-feet annually. That would total up to 5.9 billion gallons. Brothers said the potential cut for Nevada and other users still has to be negotiated.

Cuts would be dictated by the outcome of this year's snowfall in the Rocky Mountains, the source of most of the water in the Colorado River.

Lakes Mead and Powell, the primary reservoirs for the Colorado River, are half full after more than five years of drought. On Thursday, a federal researcher told the conference attendees that next spring's snowmelt could send twice as much water to Lake Powell as this year's snowmelt did. That would give the region close to a normal water year.

But it would take years of above average snowfall in the Rocky Mountains to return the reservoirs to their 1999 levels, when the lakes were nearly full.

Negotiations on how to institute cuts because of the drought have pitted the lower basin states against the upper basin states of Colorado, Utah, New Mexico and Wyoming, which have a legal obligation to keep 9 million acre-feet annually to the lower basin from Lake Powell.

Other issues include Arizona's most-junior priority status in the lower basin, and Mexico's annual take of more than 1.5 million acre-feet.

Griles said Friday that all of those issues have to be on the table, but that conditions on the river mean that recommendations from the states, if they are to come at all, are needed soon.

"Reality is here and it's time to deal with the shortages," he said. "The fact is, we have a drought that isn't ending and shortages are going to occur."

Griles would not say how the Interior Department would react if the states cannot reach a consensus on how to divide the allocation reduction. He noted that people had predicted failure for earlier efforts to reach water accords among the states, but negotiations have successfully produced agreements on environmental protection, interstate water storage and sharing to now-vanished surpluses.

"We can do this," he said. "We must do this."

Water officials from throughout the West said the timeline for producing a consensus plan to handle shortages is short. Herb Guenther, director of the Arizona Department of Water Resources, said he does not believe Interior will make draconian cuts immediately after April 1 if there is not a consensus in place.

"I don't think it's a drop-dead date," Guenther said. "I don't think they want to go there as responsible water managers; we're not going to let haste be the determining factor in putting together a bad plan."

Dennis Underwood, vice president of the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California, said he did not expect the Interior Secretary to impose cuts "as long as she knows progress is being made."

He said the states should be able to produce a plan relatively soon.

"We've done a lot of work," Underwood said. "We need now to bring it home."