From the Valley Courier (Ruth Heide):
The approximately 100 people attending Tuesday’s meeting, plus hundreds more, will be affected in some way by the decisions of the board of managers for the first water sub-district of the Rio Grande Water Conservation District (RGWCD.) Some audience members expressed concern, for example, that if the sub-district’s fees were too high, some farmers might go out of business, have less money to spend with local retailers who would then be negatively affected, or turn to other crops that might create overproduction problems.
Ultimately the sub-district board approved its 2011 budget, the first for the group, that sets the fees farmers within the sub-district boundaries will have to pay next year. The sub-district board will decide within the next few weeks the amount that will be assessed farmers as a variable fee in 2012 so farmers can plan ahead accordingly. The variable fee could be as much as $75 per irrigated acre. Those fees will help make water purchases required by the sub-district management plan and the court to replace injurious deletions to surface water rights, one of the main goals of the sub-district. Other fees will be assessed for operational costs and Conservation Reserve Enhancement Program application expenses.
RGWCD engineer Allen Davey provided a water history lesson about the Valley’s aquifer declines, the most dramatic of which occurred around the time of the 2002 drought. The aquifer experienced some recovery in more recent years. However, Davey said this last year (September to September) the unconfined aquifer, which he has studied for more than 30 years, experienced a decline of 106,000 acre feet. One of the goals of the sub-district is to replenish the aquifer…
Davey also provided cost estimates Tuesday night to give the sub-district board a basis for deciding how much to charge for variable fees. He said groundwater modeling has placed the amount the first sub-district has to replace to senior water rights as a result of depletions from well pumping in the range of 7,000-8,000 acre feet per year, primarily to the Rio Grande…
Sub-district board member Brian Brownell said the variable fee would be set annually, just like the budget. Sub-district board member Carla Worley said the purpose of the sub-district is to restore the aquifer, and once that goal is accomplished, “there’s no point in us existing so that fee goes away … It will probably take us 20 years to get there.”[…]
Rio Grande Water Users Association Attorney Bill Paddock added, “If the sub-district does not comply with the plan of water management, then your well will be shut off.” Colorado Division of Water Resources Division III Engineer Craig Cotten added, “Be very clear about this. The state engineer does have authority to shut down the wells in sub-district 1 if the plan is not workable.”
