GWC Well Represented at Crested Butte Public Policy Forum

On the evening of June 24, the GWC’s Doug Kenney joined Becky Mitchell, Colorado’s lead negotiator on Colorado River matters, at the Crested Butte Public Policy Forum for a conversation about current and future Colorado River issues.  Well over 100 people packed the Center for the Arts for the public event that in previous years has featured speakers as varied as Ted Turner, Sandra Day O’Connor, and the GWC’s Senior Fellow Anne Castle.

The primary focus of discussion was how “big river” issues—that is, the changing rules determining how Colorado River supplies are shared amongst the seven states—impact the availability of water on Colorado’s West Slope.   This required a review of the three numbers in the basin that increasingly are out of step: the amount of water entering the system each year through snowmelt and rain; the amount of water consumed by water users throughout the basin; and the amount of consumptive use that has been promised to water users in the Colorado River Compact and other laws. This mismatch of supplies, demands and allocations is not a new problem, but is of particular urgency now as Lakes Powell and Mead are two-thirds empty, the EIS process for new determining new reservoir operations is well underway, and the current year runoff is shaping up as one of the worst in decades.

The conversation was led by Julie Nania, an icon in Crested Butte for her work with High Country Conservation Advocates in protecting Mt. Emmons—the so-called “Red Lady”—from development into a molybdenum mine, as well as her service on the Board of Directors of the Upper Gunnison Water Conservancy District and as Executive Director and Faculty Chair of the Coldharbour Institute based at Western Colorado University.  Julie began her career at Colorado Law (class of 2011), which included a post-graduate fellowship with the GWC from 2013-2014 working on tribal water rights. Julie stands as a great example of the GWC’s ongoing influence in protecting the resources and places that we all value.