The Colorado Springs City Council plans to review Pueblo County’s permitting conditions for the proposed Southern Delivery System on Thursday night, according to a report from R. Scott Rappold writing for the Colorado Springs Gazette. From the article:
Utilities officials and city council members will hold a 7 p.m. public hearing at City Hall. In the works for more than a decade, the $1.1 billion pipeline is designed to meet water demands here through 2046 and provide redundancy in the water system, in case of drought or failure in the city’s other lines that carry water across hundreds of miles of mountain terrain…
To view a complete list of the conditions, visit http://www.co.pueblo.co.us. The conditions are designed to minimize the impact of pipeline construction and to mitigate the effect of sending more treated effluent down Fountain Creek. City council will vote on the conditions April 14. Pueblo County commissioners must then vote to issue the permit.
More coverage from Chris Woodka writing for the Pueblo Chieftain:
The public hearing will be at 7 p.m. Thursday at Colorado Springs City Hall, 107 N. Nevada Ave.
If the pipeline comes from Pueblo Dam, as the partners propose, Pueblo West would be able to tap into it to increase its water supply by up to 18 million gallons per day.
Council is scheduled to vote on the conditions at its April 14 meeting. Pueblo County Commissioners approved the conditions last month after a public hearing concluded. The hearing actually began in December and was continued over four months because of the complexity of the conditions…
…Colorado Springs Utilities filed for a permit last year. At March’s public hearing, Colorado Springs attorney David Robbins indicated the conditions for the permit were legally acceptable with modifications in language to include all SDS partners rather than just Colorado Springs as applicants. The SDS pipeline would cross 14 miles of Pueblo County and generate increased flows through exchanges, development and wastewater along Fountain Creek. The permit requires Colorado Springs to fund $50 million of projects for Fountain Creek through a newly created district, and to make $75 million in improvements to its sewer system by 2024. A total of $300,000 is set aside for a study of dams on Fountain Creek, and Colorado Springs is committed to several other projects regarding the Fountain under the proposed conditions. It also sets up a 3,000-acre-foot pool of water in Lake Pueblo to augment the Arkansas River below Pueblo Dam in extremely dry times. The Pueblo Board of Water Works and Colorado Springs jointly will provide water for that pool. There are numerous other conditions dealing with construction, roads and easement acquisition in the Pueblo County 1041 permit.
Formal acceptance of the terms and conditions by the Colorado Springs City Council is required for final approval of the 1041 permit by Pueblo County. Written comments will be accepted at the Colorado Springs City Clerk’s office until 5 p.m. April 9.