Free River Condition. Governor Polis gets both barrels at the 11/13 Joint Budget Committee. Red Green plays me out. Back on Sunday.
Free River Condition
The Sun actually allows someone to give counterpoint to one of their "expert" study authors?
You could knock me over with ... well, you know the idiom.
The article itself details a provision embedded in our state constitution about water. The actual language is in the quote from the article I took as screenshot 1.
As alluded to in the quote, if there is "extra" water in the river at any given point in the year, the extra is up for grabs. Note, however, that the extra is not defined as a quantity, rather the extra is defined as a flow rate (something much easier to quantify--see the second link below for an earlier discussion where I talk about a friend that let me tag along on doing flood irrigation and the flume used to measure flow and infer quantity).
Let's put some numbers to it and keep things simple. Let's say that the Colorado River only had three users, A, B, C, and D. The users have water rights that are in that order for priority too (i.e. A has senior rights to B, who is senior to C and so on).
Each user is allowed to divert 10 cubic feet per second (CFS) of flow from the river for their use. That means that for all to be satisfied, there needs to be at least 40 CFS of flow so that by the time the water gets out to A (the most senior and far flung) there is enough flow for their operation.
Quick note: all of this depends on all users A, B, C, and D wanting their water. If, say, A didn't want their water, B, C, and D could use water for a flow of 30 CFS and anything above 30 would put the them in a Free River condition
Now let's say that we've had a dry year and there is only 20 CFM of flow in the river. Also, because it's dry, everyone wants their share of water. Users A and B can put a "call" on the water to make sure they get their share and to make sure their priority is honored. This means C and D cannot divert any. Senior users get to have their share first.
The Free River condition is the opposite of this case. Free River would be, in my toy example, if there was 60 CFM of flow in the river. Everyone has enough for their allotment and thus by our state constitution, river water is now up for grabs. A, B, C, and D can take their 10 CFS and more. As a matter of fact, any user that puts the water to beneficial use can take in a Free River condition. You don't need any water rights then.
This is, and it's mentioned in the article, a boon to Ag in this state because it allows ranchers and farmers to have access to water above and beyond their water rights (and/or seniority) at certain times of year when the water flow is high like Spring runoff.
And then along comes a study. An economist at the University of Virginia, Peter Debaere, put out a recent paper advocating for discontinuing Free River usage as a way to keep more water in rivers during dry times.
The article is a lengthy explanation of that paper which I will leave to you to read up on if you're intersted.
The thing that stuck out to me (besides what in the world Free River condition meant) was the fact that the Sun author actually took the time to interview critical of this study. As an avid media watcher, I can't tell you how rare this is. Frequently studies are presented (especially in the Sun) as unassailable and written by disinterested, neutral experts.
Screenshot 2 has a series of (sometimes) discontiguous quotes giving the counterpoint on the study.
My gracious. Can you imagine what journalism and our public discussion would look like if reporters made a habit of actively seeking out disagreement and then laying the arguments of both sides in front of the reader?
Why it would almost be like as if they wanted to give us a fuller picture of our world and respected our ability to make up our minds!
https://coloradosun.com/2024/11/11/free-river-rule-colorado-river-crisis/
Related
Some odds and ends on Free River condition that came up in talking with the Lower Arkansas River Water Conservancy District engineer (my reference for the above).
In no particular order:
The Lower Arkansas River Water Conservancy District has not been in a Free River condition since about 2000 or so. 25 years!
The Lower South Platte (my area) often is in Free River condition during Winter because fewer users are taking water out to irrigate. Farmers capitalize on this by diverting often in Winter to retention ponds. These ponds allow water to seep down to unconfined ground water on or new their land and allow them to claim credit on the water them pump from their wells.
If I remember right, it was the Yampa River in NW Colorado that has not had a call on its water until relatively recently. This mostly reflects the fact that there is more water than users up there. At least for now.
Governor Polis gets both barrels at the 11/13 Joint Budget Committee (JBC) hearing.
Governor Polis was in front of the JBC on the 13th and faced some rather difficult questioning from (some of the) committee.
The disagreement centered mainly on what the governor is proposing to cut in his budget to make up for the big hole in our state's finances.
Senator Kirkmeyer in particular went after Polis and stayed after him for not only his current decisions but his past decisions re. the budget.
Her grilling starts at about the 9:23 AM mark in the audio from the hearing linked first below and continues til about 9:39 AM.
Not too long after that, about the 10 AM mark, our governor excused himself for another engagement. Questions getting too hot? Late for an interview about how he passed all kinds of measures in this state to limit our income tax? But I kid from love.
What and how much gets spent or cut is fundamental to governance. I know there are more engaging topics, but we have to get budgeting right. Frankly I join Senator Kirkmeyer (a Republican on the JBC) in her consternation at the governor leaving early. See screenshot 1 from her Twitter account.
I realize it's not an appearance to get his name on national media, but this is important. He's proposing a budget, he's making choices, he's prioritizing, and for him to leave the room early so his underling can handle the details is not okay in my book.
One other detail before signing off. The Colorado Politics article linked second below goes into more detail on the tough questions Polis got (from both sides of the aisle actually not just Republicans).
In listening to the hearing and in reading, I think the governor kept up a pretty consistent refrain that went essentially like this (not an actual quote), "well, we have a shortfall and I've cut from everywhere and we've tightened our belt."
This was what both he and his underling cited when pushed by Kirkmeyer on why the cuts couldn't have been deeper. I attached the rather lengthy quote from the Colorado Politics article as screenshot 2 to save space.
Take note of what I highlighted in red. Then look at the Governor's budget staffer's response.
Right there.
Right there you have the government in a nutshell (and, frankly, not always just Democrats).
The governor says he's put in cuts (of 1%) and this caused heartburn. Kirkmeyer (rightfully) points out that the government has grown by leaps and bounds under his leadership. Then you have the budget director saying that cuts would be tough because some of the priorities put in place would suffer or have to be curtailed/eliminated.
What did we ever do to make this state function before we had our government swelling up like a bee sting? How much of the growth has been necessary to make things work and how much was bloat?
Undoubtedly some, our state has definitely grown, but you cannot convince me that it's all entirely necessary. And the bigger problem is often that government spending is a one-way ratchet. Once instituted, good luck cutting.
And all done with our money.
https://sg001-harmony.sliq.net/00327/Harmony/en/PowerBrowser/PowerBrowserV2/20241119/54/16264
https://www.coloradopolitics.com/news/colorado-budget-committee-criticizes/article_bf4eb4c8-a5ce-11ef-b5fa-1f70d7ffb7c7.html
The Red Green Show
With Thanksgiving coming up, I'm going to end the week early. This last post today marks the last one til next Sunday.
I'll be taking some days off to rest and enjoy the holiday. I hope you have a chance to as well!
In the tradition of ending the week's writing with something fun not related to politics, I present you the following: The Red Green show.
The house I grew up in was a resolutely non-cable-TV house (it was resolutely non-air-conditioning one too but let's put that aside for now). This, combined with my sometimes unconventional tastes, meant that I ended up liking and watching a lot of PBS.
Late, late on Saturday nights there was a show I would catch when coning home from tooling around with friends: The Red Green Show. Out on the Plains, I cannot seem to get an antenna powerful enough to get broadcast TV and, since moving, I have returned to a non-cable-TV house, so I'm not sure if it's still on.
It is on YouTube it seems. The first link below is to a little snippet in case you weren't familiar with the show and wanted to have a sample.
Not all of their jokes landed (in addition to things like below there was a cadre of recurring characters), but on balance I found it funny more often than not. I end up looking it up every so often on YouTube for a quick detour down memory lane when I should be working.
Have a good Thanksgiving! I hope you get a chance to divert a little down memory lane yourself.
Back at it on Sunday barring something I find important. See you then!
p.s. Want to know the other late Saturday night show I made time for, the one that came after Red Green? Red Dwarf, a British Sci Fi comedy show. Enjoyed this one enough that I bought the series on DVD.
Happy Thanksgiving and enjoy your all to short break!!
I love the Red Green show. I worked midnight shifts on the weekends when it first came on so it and the other "Brit Comedy Bus" shows that came on PBS Saturday night before I left the house were a staple. Went and caught all his touring shows up at the Paramount in Denver while he was doing them as well.