NEWS Endangered Species
SPECIAL ESA & Water Coverage CLASSIFIEDSLINKS
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Methow Valley
News January 13, 2000 Endangered Species Local group sifts through water rights tangle Goal is accurate data for basin watershed by Lee Hicks Abandoned irrigation ditches and stream diversion points and water rights unused for generations are part of the focus for a watershed planning committee that hopes to clean up outdated state data regarding Methow basin water use. Members of the water budget committee of the county watershed planning unit got a firsthand look last Wednesday (Jan. 5) at the computer data base for water claims and certificates maintained by the state Department of Ecology. For some members it was a quick study in recognizing just how muddled are the overlapping claims and certificates carried in the DOE’s water registry. A clear illustration of the problem came as DOE officials displayed diversion points and water records for the Twisp River on a large screen. The graphics and table, generated from a laptop computer running the agency’s water data software, showed 49 diversions along the river. Committee members quickly pointed out that only about seven diversions now exist on that stream reach. In another case, Max Judd asked DOE data specialist Ron Dixon to display several locations south of Carlton, in the Gold Creek and McFarland Creek areas. Judd was immediately able to identify many ground and surface diversions that are no longer used. One ditch of nearly seven miles and dating before World War II was never able to deliver water along its route, Judd explained. Judd and Michael Gage, both members of the Methow Valley Irrigation District, also pointed out a dramatic discrepancy between the amount of water used and that carried on DOE records for their ditch. State records show MVID diverts about 700 acre feet from the Twisp River alone. But the ditch actually withdraws about 80 acre feet, the MVID members said. Another example of the problem, committee members noted, is the one-cubic-feet-per-second right to the Forest Service for stock watering throughout the Wolf Creek watershed, much of it now unused. Dixon said his agency’s claims register, "makes no effort to interpret what has been filed..." The data provides a base for committee members to weed through outdated information and begin a "ground truthing" process. "You guys are already ground truthing with what you know," observed Ray Henecke, the DOE liaison to the county watershed planning unit. "If this information is this useless, how can they say we are overallocated?" asked Dick Ewing of the water budget committee. Ewing’s observation was echoed by Terry O’Reilly: "One of the things that we need to get off the table is that the basin is overallocated," O’Reilly said. The potential overallocation, sometimes implied by top DOE and National Marine Fisheries Service officials, continues to be debated in relation to water NMFS says is needed to aid recovery of endangered fish species. Henecke and Dixon said the agency’s water right data bases include anything from statements of claims, applications and permits and certifications issued by DOE. The system enables a range of analysis, including priority dates of a right, sources, purpose and place of use, instantaneous and annual water quantity, size of parcels irrigated and other factors. In the Methow basin, and other areas of Central Washington, a geographic system links some of the information in the data base to land surveys. As information is updated, it can be displayed graphically for surface and groundwater uses. Topographical maps and aerial photographs can be overlaid as well. DOE is making the customized software available to Okanogan County and the planning unit to begin the process. Following the meeting, the planning unit committee took a proposal to begin their analysis to the full planning unit meeting last Wednesday at the Twisp Community Center. The committee will home in on each of the seven major basin stream reaches in its effort to sort out flawed information. Budget committee member Carl Miller said the updated analysis will be critical for irrigation in the coming season in the face of continued debate over how to address water issues in relation to endangered fish. NMFS forced the Forest Service to shut down irrigators last season. "We need to find a way to get a ticket from NMFS to see that we don’t get shut down in July," Miller said.
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