Reservoir plan isn’t watertight

It’s been nine years since Colorado Springs decided that building a pipeline from the Pueblo Reservoir and enlarging the lake was the best way to meet future water needs.

In that time, city officials have cut deals with other cities and water districts, gaining support for the Southern Delivery System. They’ve mapped a preliminary route for the pipeline and spent $32 million on planning, engineering and land acquisition for the project.

Nearly a decade into their work, though, they have not quieted every opponent and have not been able to get federal backing to study the impact of reservoir expansion.

Yet officials remain so confident they will be able to build the proposed system that they do not have a long-term backup plan in place.

Chatter has increased in recent months from landowners and conservationists who say Colorado Springs Utilities should look at other options.

Those options include examining two other reservoir sites and not expanding its water-delivery system.

Most City Council members will have none of it, saying that utility leaders have examined all possibilities and none compares with the Southern Delivery System.

But SDS critics, including one councilman, won’t go away.

“I just thought that we should have other options,” said Councilman Tom Gallagher, a proponent of expanding Brush Hollow Reservoir rather than the lake in Pueblo. “But we’re doing Southern Delivery, regardless of cost.”

The $940 million Southern Delivery System involves construction of a 43-mile pipeline from Pueblo that will increase the city’s daily water capacity by 50 percent. The plan also will expand the reservoir in about 20 years to provide enough water for the area to grow through 2040.

The U.S. Bureau of Reclamation is studying environmental effects of the project and is expected to present recommendations in about a year. Then, if the city gets an OK from the Pueblo County Board of Commissioners, it can start building the pipeline and bring it online by 2011.

That’s a best-case scenario.

But what if new hurdles arise and the Southern Delivery System is delayed or, like the Homestake II project in the 1990s, killed?

Technically, there is a backup plan.

If something slows the pipeline, the city will drill wells to pull groundwater from the Denver Basin and build a plant to reuse wastewater.

The strategy could buy time until another long-term option is found, utilities regional project manager Gary Bostrom said, but it could only be a stopgap.

Utility leaders have examined several options since 1989, including pipelines from the west and the southeast.

They decided the Southern Delivery System was the cheapest and least environmentally destructive, Bostrom said.

Since 2002, city officials have tried to sell cities and river districts on the project.

Mayor Lionel Rivera and Vice Mayor Richard Skorman are negotiating with the loudest detractor, the Lower Arkansas Valley Water Conservancy District. Rivera, Skorman and Lower Ark general manager Jay Winner characterized the talks as moving along quickly to a resolution.

“The alternatives to Southern Delivery are, I think, less necessary to study at this point because it looks like we’re going to have a resolution that everybody can agree on,” Councilman Jerry Heimlicher said. “I don’t think we need to be concerned with alternatives.”

Gallagher doesn’t accept that. He said the city has not done thorough studies of any alternative plans since 1996.

He and developer Mark Morley say they have a cheaper and less controversial plan that involves expanding a Penrose-area reservoir.

Conservationist Dave Gardner also disagrees with Heimlicher’s assumptions. He believes the city has failed to consider the impact of growth that comes with the Southern Delivery System.

Dave Miller, a water rights developer, questions why the city is pressing ahead with the Pueblo Reservoir option.

He wants to build a high-altitude reservoir on the Western Slope he says could supply multiple Front Range communities without so many political problems.

Recently, opponents have become more active.

Miller has spoken and written to Sen. Ken Salazar, D-Colo. Gardner has formed a political action committee, and Gallagher has lobbied fellow council members.

Rivera dismissed Miller and Morley’s plans as ones that they are pushing because they will benefit them financially. But both men say their overriding thoughts are on how to get water to this region without further roadblocks.

So the critics continue trying to get someone to take a long look at their plans.

“If there was something that could save half a billion dollars, wouldn’t you look at it?” Morley asked.

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