Bill Trampe via the Colorado Water Conservation Board
This year’s winner is Bill Trampe. Here’s the bio from the Colorado River District:
“I’m looking out and see a whole lot of people who deserve it more than I do…I hope I can live up to it.” — Bill Trampe
Bill Trampe represents Gunnison County. He served as president of the Colorado River District Board in 2006 and 2007. Upon serving out his term limit, he was designated by the board in 2008 to continue key negotiator roles he had performed in the Black Canyon of the Gunnison reserved federal water rights case and the Colorado River Basin Proposal on water supply solutions.
Mr. Trampe is a lifelong cattle rancher who has coupled his everyday experiences in water with involvement in water organizations. Mr. Trampe has a strong interest in natural resource issues, quality of life issues and the sustainability of communities whose economies depend on water.
Mr. Trampe was a founding member of the Gunnison Ranchland Conservation Legacy and served on the Upper Gunnison River Water Conservancy District Board.
Mr. Trampe is participating in the state’s Water for the 21st Century (HB1177) process, sitting on the Gunnison River Basin Roundtable.
Mr. Trampe’s current term expires January 2015.
In 2012 Mr. Trampe authored the paper “Risk Assessment Scenario for Portfolio Tool” to accompany the Gunnison Basin Roundtable’s formal comments on “Colorado’s Water Supply Future Portfolio and Trade-off Tool.” The planning tool examines different combinations of strategies or “portfolios” for meeting the state’s future municipal and industrial water needs. Mr. Trampe’s paper outlines the basic concepts the Gunnison Basin Roundtable members have concerning procedures or a process to employ risk management in order to avoid a Colorado River Compact curtailment.
That two-word description is one way to boil down the Colorado Water Plan, all 2,000 pages and 15,000 comments on it, the Colorado Water Congress learned Thursday.
“We have to be smarter. We’re not going to have enough to do everything we want,” Gov. John Hickenlooper admitted in response to a question about how to provide water for 2-3 million more people in the state in the next 20 years with expected drop in water supply. “We are in a state that’s growing, and that growth has to figure out a way to use a lot less water.”
At the same time, the governor was brimming with optimism when it comes to solutions to the urban water gap.
Several times during his “State of the State’s Water” address to about 500 people at the CWC annual conference, Hickenlooper recognized water innovators by having them stand and take a bow. They included former lawmakers Russ George and Diane Hoppe; the Fort Morgan Irrigation Co., which developed water sharing agreements with Public Service Co.; Molson Coors, for its work since 1990 to improve the Clear Creek watershed; and innovators Chris Klein and Franz Garsombke, founders of Rachio, who developed a way to control sprinklers by smartphone. Those examples are just part of an approach that will be needed to deal with the water crises of the future, he said.
“In the next 20 years, we will add 2-3 million more people, and we’ve got to face that headon,” Hickenlooper said. “We know the climate is changing, regardless of the reason, so we always have to keep in mind the possibility of drought.”
He also stressed the importance of preserving agriculture.
“We’ve got to support locally grown food,” Hickenlooper said. “The water plan puts us on an actionable path.”
The governor deflected tougher questions about the state budget — water officials are concerned about siphoning mineral severance funds to balance it — to Henry Sobanet, the state’s budget director.
Sobanet called the constitutional formulas that control revenue and spending “insane” and said the state is facing a “nutrient sandwich” (to put in terms water people understand) as costs for education and health care continue to hog a bigger share of the budget pie.
A shortfall of $148 million in other areas would result this year without adjustment, and health and education shares are expected to grow, he said.
While the Colorado economy has been surging above the national rate since the 2008 recession, mineral severance taxes are expected to fall because of low oil and gas prices. At the same time, the funds used for water projects and local impacts may be swept into the general fund.
James Eklund, director of the Colorado Water Conservation Board, congratulated the group for helping develop the water plan.
“Many said the problem was too big to solve, but you saw its importance as too big to fail,” he said.
The population growth in Colorado and other Western states cannot continue unless water supply challenges are met, Gov. John Hickenlooper and state planners said Thursday in opening the Colorado Water Congress annual conference.
“That growth has to figure out a way to use a lot less water or the growth will stop,” Hickenlooper told hundreds of water professionals in response to a question by a water board member. “It’s pretty much, I mean, black and white. We find a way to use a lot less water per person or we don’t have more people coming here. There is no magic.”
After beginning his State of the State address last week by highlighting water limits, Hickenlooper used the gathering of the 400-member congress to amplify his push for a robust and unprecedented Colorado Water Plan.
The state faces a 163 billion gallon projected water shortfall by 2050 that, as today’s population of 5.3 million grows to 10 million and industry expands, threatens to leave 2.5 million people parched. A draft plan unveiled in December lacks specifics such as conservation targets and criteria for new state-supported supply projects.
But the 344-page draft lists potential projects costing $18 billion to $20 billion to be done by 2050.
Hickenlooper said state planners are taking a long-range perspective that leads to a look at larger projects — but he said that financing major projects likely must rely on private investment because of state fiscal difficulties and diminished federal capacity to build new dams and reservoirs.
Constructing new water storage systems “helps a little bit,” Hickenlooper said. “But in the bigger picture, it is not the whole answer.”
Dealing with problems such as south Denver suburbs’ heavy dependence on dwindling groundwater will be addressed in the final state plan, due Dec. 10, said James Eklund, director of the Colorado Water Conservation Board, who has led creation of the plan. Eklund said the state may seek help from a Stanford University water expert pioneering measurement and monitoring of underground water — in shallow aquifers along rivers such as the South Platte and Arkansas as well as portions of the deep aquifers south suburbs have tapped.
Emerging water-sharing infrastructure projects may help shift south suburbs off dwindling groundwater, in return for assurances they do not try to divert more water from the deteriorating Colorado river basin.
“The more we can put the south metro house in order, the better the entire state is,” Eklund said. “It is kind of the knot you untie that alleviates pressure.”
Click here to go to the US Drought Monitor website. Here’s an excerpt:
Summary
Temperatures during the last week were well above normal over the majority of the United States, with departures of up to 20 degrees Fahrenheit above normal over the High Plains and northern Rocky Mountains. A few areas did experience temperatures below normal, mainly confined to west Texas and eastern New Mexico as well as southern New England, where departures were 5-10 degrees Fahrenheit below normal. At the end of the current Drought Monitor period, a strong winter storm impacted much of the northeastern United States with strong winds and snow. Most of the country was fairly dry over the last week with the southern plains, Gulf Coast, and southeast receiving the most precipitation. The western United States remained dry, and some areas are on track to having one of the driest Januarys on record…
The High Plains
As with the Midwest, warm and dry conditions dominated the region. Temperatures were 5-15 degrees Fahrenheit above normal for the week with very few places recording any precipitation. In response to short-term conditions, D1 was expanded north in North Dakota this week…
The West
Continuing the pattern for most of January, the week ended with warm and mainly dry conditions over the western United States. Temperatures were 5-10 degrees Fahrenheit above normal, and only portions of northwest Washington and eastern New Mexico recorded any precipitation of significance. With the ongoing drought, drought intensity did increase in portions of western Nevada as D4 conditions were expanded to the south and D3 conditions were expanded in the north. In eastern Nevada, D1 was introduced along the border with Utah. A large expansion of abnormally dry conditions was introduced from northeast Utah into Wyoming and western Colorado. In Oregon, the D1 conditions were expanded to the west along the Cascades while in Washington, D0 was expanded in the west and northern portions of the state as well as in northeast Washington into the Idaho panhandle. Some areas of central Washington did see enough precipitation to warrant improvement to D2 and D1 conditions.
