Sunday, February 11, 2007

Busy week for the Arkansas River Roundtable? It looks to be a busy week coming up for the Arkansas River Roundtable, according to the Pueblo Chieftain. From the article, "The Arkansas Basin Roundtable will look at three funding proposals this week that pose questions of whether a new source of state funding should be applied to a project affecting a small area, a plan that covers a wide part of the valley or in a way that helps the state as a whole and may benefit farmers down the road. A needs assessment committee dug and scratched through the tangle of ideas at its meeting last week, voting to move all three projects to the full roundtable. The roundtable will meet at 12:30 p.m. Wednesday in the Occhiato Ballroom of the Student Center at Colorado State University-Pueblo. "The shovel: The Round Mountain Water and Sanitation District is requesting $120,000 toward a project to drill a new well to supply the Westcliffe and Silver Cliff areas with water. "The pencil: The Fountain Creek Vision Task Force wants $75,000 for a facilitator to help bring El Paso and Pueblo county interests together. "A little of both: The state wants $50,000 toward its project to study water use with a weighing lysimeter at the Colorado State University Agricultural Research Center near Rocky Ford." Category: Colorado Water 8:15:56 AM     Tom Cech: It's terrible to watch Diane Carman writes an update on the situation for farmers whose wells in the South Platte aquifer were shut down last spring, in her column in today's Denver Post. From the article, "This year likely will bring an end to Pope Farms Produce. They've been ordered to stop pumping water from their wells. They're done. 'I don't know the whole gist of it,' said Susan Pope, referring to the web of mind-numbing water laws that have pushed farms across the region to the brink of bankruptcy. 'Everybody was pumping wells, no problem, until a study came out in 1969 that said well usage was harming returning flows to the South Platte River.' Officially, that was the beginning of the end. A network of conservation districts was formed, charging farmers yearly fees to help them manage the water resources and to represent them in court. Tom Cech, executive director of one of them, the Central Colorado Water Conservancy District, said 'hundreds of millions' have been spent trying to resolve legal challenges over water rights in the state. One dispute involving Sakata and Petrocco farms is being heard in District 1 Water Court in Greeley... "The planting season is approaching and the Popes still have no access to water - except from rain. They face the prospect of trying to get by on dryland farming alone or getting jobs in the city. Farmers from Denver to Julesburg who are dependent on wells are at risk of defaulting on their mortgages and abandoning their farms. The ripple effect on rural school districts, rural economies and consumers of local produce will soon follow. 'It's terrible to watch,' Cech said. 'The farm families are sitting in court, listening to lawyers argue over water rights while the fate of the livelihoods they've known for generations hangs in the balance. Their faces tell the story.' While several years of drought have created a growing awareness of the limits of the state's water resources, Cech said the 19th-century water laws do little to encourage meaningful conservation. 'The system does not lend itself to efficient use overall.' If a water district with senior rights wants to pump to excess to irrigate golf courses and suburban lawns at the expense of farmers, there's nothing in the law to prevent it." Category: Colorado Water 8:05:57 AM     Buddy Burns: I'd like to run an activated sludge plant Congratulations to Buddy Burns who has been named the 2006 Waste Water Treatment Operator of the Year by the Colorado Rural Water Association. From the Glenwood Springs Independent (free registration required), "Burns is the superintendent of Water and Waste Water Treatment for Glenwood Springs. He started with the city in 1977... "Glenwood Springs wants to get rid of the treatment plant on Seventh Street and move it into West Glenwood, Burns said. The city would build a new, regional facility with activated sludge technology where the Chatfield house used to be. The tentative plan is to begin in 2012 and complete it by 2017, he added. Activated sludge would make the job more challenging and interactive, Burns said. That mechanism affords increased opportunity for control compared to the rotating biological contactor technology at the current plant. 'I'd like to run an activated sludge plant,' Burns said." Wouldn't everyone? Category: Colorado Water 7:53:49 AM

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