Water district in awkward position

    The Lower South Platte Water Conservancy District is stuck between a rock and a hard place when it comes to legislation to redraw the boundaries of the Republican River Water Conservation District. If the LSPWCD does nothing, wells already in the district’s augmentation plan could be forced to pay fees to the RRWCD, thus being double-taxed; oppose the legislation, and “the hammer” could fall on those wells, shutting them down permanently.
    The quandary concerns new boundaries that would place about 14 Sedgwick County irrigation wells inside the RRWCD. Those wells, referred to as “gap wells,” now are in a no man’s land between the Lower and Republican districts, but 11 of the wells are in Lower’s augmentation plan, and a 12th well is in a different augmentation plan.
    All 14 wells were thought to be in the South Platte River drainage basin, but were recently informed that they are also within the Republican River groundwater model drawn by the U.S. Geological Survey to comply with a 2002 “final stipulation” settlement among Colorado, Nebraska and Kansas. One of those wells is physically less than a mile from the South Platte river.
    The boundary is important because one of the Republican district’s responsibilities is to make sure Colorado is in compliance with a 1943 water compact with Nebraska and Kansas that allocates water from the Republican River among the three states.
    If Colorado falls out of compliance, wells impacting the Republican River boundary must be “curtailed,” or shut down, until Colorado comes back into compliance. Wells within the district are assessed an annual fee of $14.50 per irrigated acre to pay for augmentation of the Republican River to keep Colorado in compliance.
    The Republican district is working with the Colorado legislature to redraw the boundaries of the RRWCD after it was discovered that several hundred wells, mostly in Cheyenne and Kit Carson counties, are inside the Republican River groundwater model boundary — that is, depleting the river aquifer — but aren’t in the district. Those wells need to be brought into the RRWCD and the well owners will then have to pay the per-acre fees to help pay for Colorado’s augmentation plan.

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