From The Pueblo Chieftain (Chris Woodka):
During public informational meetings last week, some questions were raised about why the deadline for signup to participate in possible lease contracts came before many of the ditch companies had annual shareholder meetings. “It made sense to wait and give them the opportunity,” Schweizer said…
“We thought the meetings went really well,” Schweizer said. “We really anticipated more objections than we got. I think I admitted that I don’t know everything, but there’s not a lot we can do until we know how many participants we have.” While the main objective of the Super Ditch is to lease water, and its customers so far are outside the Lower Arkansas Valley, there are future benefits to keeping water in the valley, Schweizer said…
There are other possible benefits, such as leasing water to put into the future Arkansas Valley Conduit, Schweizer added. “There has been some talk that in a short year, Super Ditch could be a way of moving water between the canals. That would be a year when there would otherwise be no chance of raising a crop on all of the ditches,” Schweizer said. The main thrust of questions from the meetings last week centered on how much farmers could expect per acre from the two lease agreements under discussion, he added. The amount suggested in both lease agreements is $500 per acre-foot of water, although the corresponding acreage that must be dried up to reach that figure and to account for moving the water into storage at Lake Pueblo varies from ditch to ditch. It also depends on the weather conditions, availability of water and engineering restrictions.