Steamboat Pilot & Today

Oak Creek — The Oak Creek Town Board tonight will learn about proposals that could drastically alter future water use across Colorado.

Oak Creek resident Dan Craig, a member of a regional water policy group known as the Yampa/White River Basin Roundtable, will update the Town Board on the two proposals and ask the town to take an official position on the proposed plans to transfer water from the Yampa River or Flaming Gorge Reservoir across the Continental Divide to the Front Range.

"He's always provided us with great information," Oak Creek Town Clerk Karen Halterman said of Craig.

One of the proposals is by the Northern Colorado Water Conservancy District, which includes much of the northern Front Range. The $4 billion, 16-year project - a proposal only in the feasibility stage - would pump Yampa River water from the Maybell area for more than 200 miles, likely to Barr Lake near Denver International Airport.

The second proposal, led by Colorado resident Aaron P. Million, is called the Regional Watershed Supply Project. The project would pump 165,000 to 250,000 acre-feet of water per year out of Flaming Gorge Reservoir, which straddles Wyoming and Utah and stores Green River water. That water would be pumped along Wyoming's Interstate 80 corridor, then south to Fort Collins and all the way to Barr Lake, where existing or soon-to-be-built pipelines could take it as far south as Pueblo.

The privately funded project would cost $2 billion to $3 billion, said Million.

He has said the project could be completed within five years.

One acre-foot is about 325,000 gallons of water, the amount a family of four uses in an average year.

Also tonight, the Town Board will conduct a second and potentially final reading of an ordinance that would increase the minimum dog-at-large fine by $15.

"The fine would now be $65, plus a $10 surcharge," Halterman said. "It was $40 plus the charge. We also changed the wording (of the ordinance) to allow the judge to use discretion about whether to assess the fine.