City Council Minutes 2019 11 25 - Laserfiche WebLink

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City Council Meeting Minutes November 25, 2019 Page 2 of 6 Water coming from South Boulder Creek is distributed to other water sheds as well as Coal Creek which we use. If we buy agricultural water and want to change it to a municipal use that must be approved by the Water Court and we must keep flows up in the other water sheds as well. Currently, there is no infrastructure in place for water from our basin to get to the other basins so there is less of a guarantee we can transfer water uses via water decree. To assure we can get water we will need to build a pipeline but it may not be possible. Therefore even if FRICO purchases are cheaper we may not be able to use it if we can't get Water Court approval. Director Kowar reviewed the Colorado Big Thompson/Windy Gap (CBT/WG) system. The only constraint on these purchases is our own pipeline from the pump station in North End to our north water plant. There are plans to resolve that pipeline issue. Windy Gap is a great supplemental water supply. In a wet year it produces a lot of water, however we don't need water in a wet year. CBT/WG users need to build Chimney Hollow reservoir to store the excess WG water in wet years. Chimney Hollow is estimated to be on line in the mid-2020s. He noted CBT/WG water is more expensive than FRICO as it is pumped from the Western Slope. Director Kowar reviewed the water acquisition considerations including delivery cost, acquisition costs, water court risk, return flow requirements, and other issues. He noted for long-term resales CBT is the better value. Keeping firm yields in both basins helps maintain our redundancy and a firm flow rate. Director Kowar reviewed the amount of water we have, what we think we need, what the risks/threats are, and what is constraining our ability to use water we have. He reviewed the history of the City's efforts to purchase water starting with the 1979 plan. We currently use the estimate of 7120 acre feet as our annual goal. He reviewed the historical consumption of water by residential, commercial, and other uses. Water usage is going down even as population goes up, however much of that is weather dependent. Director Kowar noted City departments are charged for their water use; so other City funds pay into the Water Fund for use. Director Watson also noted the Water Fund is an enterprise fund so it must pay for itself. The Water Fund income can only come from the service it provides; this is why we haven't used water fees as a way to give incentives for new businesses. Also, TABOR states any subsidy of over 10 percent coming from another fund means the loss of TABOR status. Loss of that status would mean we cannot bond water funds without a vote of the people. Director Kowar noted the 2016 Raw Water Master Plan included 6700 acre feet as the recommended goal for firm yield. That is the firm yield goal staff works with today. He added the goal is meant to cover all possibilities and growth. That goal is for best practices for the long term.