Log In


Reset Password
News Education Local News Nation & World New Mexico

At Lake Nighthorse, senators see long road to recreation

Ute Mountain councilor presses for water delivery

Standing near the unused boat ramp at Lake Nighthorse on Friday, both Colorado senators heard about the progress toward recreation and the challenges that remain to be solved.

The Animas-La Plata Operations, Maintenance and Replacement Association has agreed on a recreation plan for the lake, which includes a boat dock at the ramp, road improvements and overflow parking. The association is made up of nine agencies.

The plan also calls for the city of Durango to annex the recreation areas. But before the lake can open, the members of the maintenance association must sign a lease, annexation and a planning-and-development agreements.

Sen. Michael Bennet, D-Colo., applauded the willingness of water-right owners to eventually allow recreation to happen.

“This will be a tremendous asset to Southwest Colorado,” he said.

Ute Mountain Ute Tribal Councilor Priscilla Blackhawk-Rentz told the senators her tribe supports recreation, but it is important to protect the lake’s water quality and the archaeological sites on its shores.

“Water to us is sacred,” Blackhawk-Rentz said.

She also stressed the need for a water-delivery system that would allow the tribe to use the water rights it owns in the lake.

The Ute Mountain Utes have rights to about 40 percent, or 38,100 acre feet, of Lake Nighthorse water. But it would take an act of Congress for the Bureau of Reclamation to build the water-delivery system to the reservation on the border of Colorado and New Mexico.

The Animas-La Plata Project was built to fulfill treaties with tribes in New Mexico and Colorado. The Ute Mountain Utes and the Southern Ute Indian Tribe have contributed millions of dollars to the project.

Sen. Cory Gardner, R-Colo., said he has spoken to the tribe about preliminary plans for a water-delivery system.

“I think it’s a legitimate concern they have,” he said.

He said he would like to see a delivery system built in a fiscally responsibly way.

“This is a commitment we have to figure out a way to fulfill,” he said.

Bennet said he could not address a question about a water-delivery system because it requires further study.

Other organizations in the Animas-La Plata Water Conservancy District also have voiced concerns about protecting water quality in the lake if it was opened to recreation.

Both senators expressed interest in how the lake would be protected from E. Coli and zebra mussels, an invasive species.

Currently, the Bureau of Reclamation plans to build a station over the summer where boats would be inspected for invasive species, said Ed Warner, the area manager for the bureau.

The bureau also has contracted with a company to complete the federally required environmental assessment of the recreation plan.

Warner could not say when the lake might open for recreation.

But Cathy Metz, the director of parks and recreation for Durango, expressed optimism.

“We are at a turning point in our negotiations where we understand each other,” she told the senators.

mshinn@durangoherald.com

May 1, 2015
Gardner promises to fight for Denver TV


Reader Comments