Thursday, December 27, 2007

Denver plows residential areas Coyote Gulch is heading back out to plow snow in the residential areas of the city. We're putting in 12 hour shifts in an effort to keep the streets from developing the conditions everyone hated last winter. It was pretty slow going for the Ol' Coyote yesterday. We had never plowed snow before. The training we received was great but was on dry pavement. We were getting pretty good along towards the end of our shift. Of course. We're so happy that Public Works didn't schedule us for the midnight to noon shift. We'll be back tomorrow morning. 10:36:18 AM

Paper ballots for November 2008 election? It looks like the move to all paper ballots for the fall election is gaining momentum. Secretary of State John Suthers is on board, according to The Denver Post. From the article: Seeking a way to lead the state out of its voting-machine morass, Colorado Secretary of State Mike Coffman said Wednesday that he favors using paper ballots at polling places for the 2008 elections. Coffman said he has more confidence in a traditional paper-ballot-and-polling-place system than relying only on electronic-voting kiosks... Wednesday's announcement pitted Coffman against the majority of Colorado's county clerks, who last week asked legislators to allow clerks to hold mail-in ballot elections. The clerks said a mail-in election would ensure accuracy amid the voting-machine confusion and save money. "I'm less than happy," Adams County Clerk Karen Long said. Coffman did not consult with county clerks before making the recommendation, she said. "I think it really puts elections more up in the air than ever." But some voter-rights activists who are wary of electronic-voting machines and mail-in ballots approved of the plan. "It's very important that he is favoring use of the paper ballot, which provides a positively verifiable record of the voter intent," said Harvie Brans- comb, with the Colorado Voter Group. "denver 2008" 10:27:07 AM

Rising rates for Castle Pines North Castle Pines North depends on the Denver Basin Aquifer system for much of their water. Here's a look at their planning for the future, along with another fee hike, from The Denver Post. From the article: For the fourth time in four years, residents face higher costs for turning on the tap. This hotbed of residential and commercial growth must wean itself off the expensive dwindling aquifers that feed the region and instead buy renewable water supplies. To maintain the old water system while buying a new one means customers must pay more, said Jim McGrady, manager of the Castle Pines North Metro District. Castle Pines North's 3,200 customers must provide about $60 million over the next decade for the switch, he said... In Castle Pines North, price hikes since 2005 have lifted the metro district's budget from $8.9 million in 2005 to more than $16 million next year. Water and sewer rates will jump 5 percent in January, while the district's monthly fee for renewable water will jump to $20. The fee began in 2005 at $12 a month and has increased each year... Ted Lohr, president of the Castle Pines North metro district board, is concerned about the impact of higher water costs, but he's more concerned about failing to makes plans to provide for water shortages, which a 2003 study predicted to be about 20 years away. "colorado water" 10:16:54 AM

2008 Democratic National Convention Denver will get $50 million for the 2008 Democratic National Convention now that President Bush has signed the 2007 Omnibus Spending Bill, according to The Rocky Mountain News. From the article: The Democratic National Convention is scheduled Aug. 25-28, but officials have been planning security for the event despite not having the promise of the federal funds. They were working on the assumption the money would come because a city the size of Denver couldn't foot the bill itself. Officials have said they wanted to incur no debt and didn't want to rely on government reimbursement for security expenditures -- making the $50 million vital to that end." "2008 pres" 10:08:17 AM

Pipeline for compliance on the Republican River? From ACP Construction Data, "To help the state of Colorado comply with the Republican River Compact between Colorado, Kansas and Nebraska, the Republican River Water Conservation District hopes to build a Compact Compliance Pipeline capable of delivering 15,000 acre-feet of water per year from wells located 10-20 miles north of the North Fork of the Republican River directly into the North Fork near the Colorado-Nebraska state line. With a $50,000 grant provided by the Colorado Water Conservation Board, RRWCD will complete an engineering feasibility study of the pipeline this month and, based on results of the study, will seek a loan from the CWCB Construction Loan Program to fund the project, estimated to cost between $80 million and $100 million. RRWCD hopes to begin construction next fall with the goal of delivering water to the river in the latter part of 2009." "colorado water" 9:55:40 AM

Norm Yoast: Our kids test just as well or better Up in Craig their teaching about water in the middle school. We're thinking that they're turning out future engineers, environmentalists and lawyers. Here's an article about the program from The Craig Daily Press. From the article: He came. They tested. They passed. A Craig Middle School class that tests the local river water quality recently proved to a representative from the Colorado RiverWatch Program what it could do. The students' performance on the evaluation ensured the CMS RiverWatch class could continue collecting water samples for state agencies. The test also proved the students could test the waters with the best of them, CMS science teacher Norm Yoast said... The Colorado RiverWatch Program, which works with the Colorado Water Conservation District and the Colorado Division of Wildlife, uses school and community volunteers to monitor the health of streams and rivers in the state. Once a month, the groups collect and test samples from one or more water test sites. The DOW and the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment use the test results to evaluate water quality. The program provides "a hands-on experience for individuals to understand the value and function of the river ecosystem" and allows participants "to collect quality aquatic ecosystem data over space and time to be used for the Clean Water Act and other water quality decision-making processes," according to the Colorado RiverWatch Web site. Once a year, the program sends an evaluator to each of its volunteer groups to observe testing practices, he said. That test came for Yoast's RiverWatch elective class Dec. 17. The evaluator gave the students pretested water samples and then compared the students' results with his own. His verdict? Students' test results varied from the evaluator's by no more than one percentile, Yoast said. "That's great," Yoast said. "I was really proud of them." In his 16 years teaching the class, both Yoast and his students have benefited from the projects. Students learn chemistry and how humans impact river systems, Yoast said. They also learn how to respond to environmental issues occurring locally... This year, his elective class students are studying a recent proposition to pump water from the Yampa River to the Front Range. "Kids will look at how (the project) would affect the river and the valley," Yoast said. "It's just one of the ways of making kids aware of water issues in their backyard." Ultimately, they will write letters to government officials offering their opinion on the issue. More Coyote Gulch coverage here. "colorado water" 9:50:49 AM

Family Farm Alliance: Relying on agriculture to be a 'shock absorber' to soften or eliminate the impending water shortage is not planning The Pueblo Chieftain takes a look at the impact on agriculture from water transfers to cities. From the article: The average age of the farmer keeps climbing, and fewer young people are considering careers in agriculture. The demographic trend of fewer farmers is nothing new and not limited to the Arkansas Valley. In the valley, however, when farmers leave the land, the water is more often leaving with them. The revenues from a water sale may be a farmer's 401(k) at the end of a long career. A report by the Family Farm Alliance in 2006 noted: "In the 1930s, there were close to 7 million farms in the United States. Today, just over 2 million farms remain. Of the remaining farmers, roughly 565,000 are family operations, farming just over 415 million acres or 44 percent of total farmland. And 330 farm operators leave their land every week." In a subsequent 2007 report, the same group stated: "We must begin to plan now, and not wait until we are forced to make decisions during a crisis. Relying on agriculture to be a 'shock absorber' to soften or eliminate the impending water shortage is not planning." While years of drought and depressed farm prices also took a toll in the valley, bouncing back will be harder. Farmers have debt and may need to upgrade equipment neglected during the lean years. The willingness of farmers to sell, for the right price, has been demonstrated over and over. First came the Twin Lakes Colorado Canal and Rocky Ford sales. About 20 percent of farmers on the Fort Lyon sold to High Plains A&M. Tri-State Generation and Transmission was able to purchase more than half of the Amity Canal for a planned coal power plant in a little over a year. Pueblo West and the Board of Water Works are attempting to buy a controlling interest in the Bessemer Ditch... One plan in the works, promoted by the Lower Arkansas Valley Water Conservancy District, would create a land fallowing, water lease management organization, nicknamed Super Ditch, that would attempt to keep water rights in the hands of farmers, while allowing leases of part of their water to cities. The concept of sharing has been promoted statewide as a way to share water in future years, generally as a lease-back from a city purchasing ag rights. The Super Ditch is one of the few programs in Colorado that would allow farmers to retain control... Another solution, held out by alternative fuel markets for biodiesel and ethanol, is to make farming more profitable. There are no large-scale operations in the valley yet. Construction of a $24 million ethanol plant north of Lamar has stalled, apparently because of state regulatory requirements. As cities grow, they are looking more intently at agricultural water as a source to meet future needs. Agriculture still uses about 85 percent of the water in the Arkansas River basin. - The issue: More than 70,000 acres of farmland - one-fifth of the total downstream of Pueblo Dam - have disappeared from the Arkansas Valley between municipal transfers and cutbacks from well-pumping following the Kansas v. Colorado Supreme Court lawsuit over the Arkansas River Compact. - What's at stake: The Statewide Water Supply Initiative estimated the Arkansas Valley gap in municipal supplies could dry up another 70,000 acres. - Why it matters: Agriculture is a major part of the valley's economy, with direct sales totaling $465.5 million, 6,000 jobs and $929 million in ag-related sales, according to the 2002 Census of Agriculture. - Who's involved: Water rights are a property right by use and can be sold. Individual farmers have control of them. "colorado water" 9:38:23 AM

Colorado River management Here's the first in a series on water issues called "Every Drop Counts" from The Cortez Journal. From the article: The days are getting hotter, and the snow is melting faster. The North American growing season has extended an average of two days a decade since the 1950s, mostly because of springtime warming, according to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. The Southwest has been in a drought for seven years, and 2002 was one of the two or three driest years since the 1500s. That's not good news for the Colorado River Basin, which includes the Four Corners. Some water managers have started to say what was once unspeakable: We might be running out of water. "You don't have to look too deeply to give yourself a good scare," said Mark Waage, Denver Water's manager of raw water supply. "It's hard to ignore, all the evidence and projections coming out, particularly in the last year."[..] To help them plan, water managers look to the past. All of their assumptions for how much water the state can expect come from the experience of the past 100 years. But the drought that started in 1999 is almost certain to be worse than any 10-year period during the 20th century. And research into tree rings has uncovered much worse droughts in the past several hundred years. At the same time, scientists are predicting global warming will leave less water in rivers. On paper, Colorado should get 3.8 million acre-feet a year -- giving the state more than 1 million acre-feet of surplus water. But the state's true share might be more like 2.6 million acre-feet, said Eric Kuhn, head of the Colorado River Water Conservation District, an organization set up by the Legislature to protect and develop the river basin. Once the Animas-La Plata project opens, Colorado will use about 2.6 million acre-feet a year, Kuhn told Southwestern water experts in November. If he is right, then new water projects could push Colorado into violation of the 1922 compact, forcing people across the state to cut back on their water use. "If we want to have very low risk in our water supply, then there's none left," Kuhn said in an interview. State demographers estimate 3 million people will move to Colorado within 30 years, mostly to the Front Range. To serve them, a Fort Collins man wants to build a 400-mile pipeline from Southwest Wyoming to the Front Range. A water district on the northern plains has plans for a 250-mile pipeline to send part of the Yampa River east across the mountains. International oil companies own massive rights in Western Colorado that they have never used, but could if they start mining for oil shale. If Colorado's share of the river is almost used up, any one of these projects could take the rest of the water legally available and limit the ability of people in Southwest Colorado to use more water... Ken Wright, a renowned Denver water engineer, has studied the waterworks of ancient civilizations in Mesa Verde and South America. He discovered that once a reliable source of water disappears, civilizations tend to quickly fall apart. "I'm talking about empires that were prosperous and grew for 600/800 years, and then collapsed overnight," he said. The South Americans were good engineers, like the ancestral Puebloans, but they were done in by long droughts and floods. "What happens is this: If you can't provide security and food for your citizens, they lose their loyalty to the central government," Wright said. Read the whole article. They list the players in water in Southwestern Colorado. "colorado water" 9:08:36 AM

Federal dough for Animas-La Plata and Bayfield The Animas-La Plata project and Bayfield's water treatment plant both will get funding now that President Bush has signed the omnibus spending bill on Wednesday, according to The Durango Herald. From the article: Funding for numerous projects in Southwest Colorado is included in the 2008 Omnibus Appropriation Bill signed by President Bush on Wednesday. The projects and associated funding include: - $60.39 million for continued work on the Animas-La Plata Project. The project includes a dam in Ridges Basin and pumping station on the Animas River in Durango and will result in the creation of Lake Nighthorse. The reservoir is expected to start filling in 2009. The project implements the Colorado Ute Indian Water Rights agreement providing final settlement of water-right claims for both the Southern Ute and Ute Mountain Ute tribes. The project also is expected to provide water for the city of Durango, La Plata County, areas of New Mexico and the Navajo Nation. - $393,760 to improve the Bayfield sewage-treatment facility. The total cost of the upgrade is $7 million. "colorado water" 8:38:53 AM

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