From the Colorado Independent (Scott Kersgaard):
“We have to get serious about water,” Republican gubernatorial candidate Dan Maes said during a debate Saturday. When the Colorado Independent asked Democratic nominee John Hickenlooper on Friday what campaign issue was not getting enough coverage, his answer was “water.”[…]
Everybody knows water is an issue in the West. Hickenlooper brags regularly that Denver has cut per capita water use by nearly 20 percent during his tenure. According to The Times, Phoenix and Las Vegas have each made similar cuts in usage. Hickenlooper said he expects Denver consumption to continue going down. The fact that Denver has a legal right to a certain amount of water does not mean Denver should use it all, he said. Hickenlooper said some of the things that make Denver a great place to live require that other places in the state have water as well. In the past he has pointed to some of the recreational uses that Denverites rely on water for — such as fishing, skiing and whitewater rafting. At a debate recently in Loveland, he also pointed out that Denver needs the state’s agricultural community to have plenty of water so that people in the state can eat fresh, locally grown food. Toward that end, he said, it is important that Denver not use water just because it can.
Maes hasn’t always made a lot of sense when he’s talked about water, but he has the right idea: water will define Colorado’s future.
American Constitution Party candidate Tom Tancredo said a couple of weeks ago that Colorado has excess water storage capacity that isn’t being used because of environmental regulations and federal interference.
Hickenlooper, the mayor of Denver, said he wasn’t aware that the state had excess capacity, but did say it is very important that Colorado keeps all the water in the state that it is legally able to keep. “We need to make sure we control” all the water it is in the state’s power to control, he said.
More 2010 Colorad elections coverage here.