Opinion ID: 2823795
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Challenges to the 2012 Annual Replacement Plan and the Water Courtâs Ruling

Text: Â¶11Â Â Â Â Â Â On May 15, 2012, Objectors invoked the water courtâs retained jurisdiction in the 2010 Decree by challenging the Subdistrictâs and the State Engineerâs approval of the 2012 ARP. Â¶12Â Â Â Â Â Â The parties filed several pretrial motions, two of which are at issue here. First, Objectors filed a Motion for a Determination that the 2012 Annual Replacement Plan is Not In Effect and For an Order That the State Engineer Curtail All Subdistrict Well Pumping. 2 Objectors argued that an ARP is an extension or completion of the Amended Plan, and, therefore, the water court must review it by the same standard as the Amended Plan. In San Antonio, we held that a plan of groundwater management is akin to water rules and regulations. 270 P.3d at 939â40 (holding that the water court must review a groundwater management plan using the same standard as that for review of water rules and regulations). We held in Simpson v. Bijou Irrigation Co. that water rules and regulations cannot go into effect until the courts resolve all objections to them. 69 P.3d 50, 55, 72 (Colo. 2003), as modified on denial of rehâg (May 27, 2003). Thus, Objectors argued that because the 2012 ARP was an extension of the Amended Plan, it likewise could not go into effect until the courts resolve all objections to it. Â¶13Â Â Â Â Â Â The water court denied this motion in an order dated August 9, 2012. The water court observed that Objectorsâ argument was effectively an extension of their previous argument, rejected by both the water court and this court in San Antonio, 270 P.3d at 931â32, that the Amended Plan should not have been approved because it lacked the details supplied in the 2012 ARP. The water court reasoned that if the Amended Plan was not complete without an ARP, it would not have been approved. See id. Thus, it concluded that an ARP is not a part, extension, or completion of the Amended Plan but, rather, a tool the Subdistrict and the Division Engineer use to predict annual stream depletions and provide the method by which, during the replacement plan year, the Subdistrict will replace those stream depletions in time, amount, and location to prevent injury. Â¶14Â Â Â Â Â Â Further, the water court reasoned that it reviews an ARP pursuant to its retained jurisdiction under section 37-92-501(4)(c), C.R.S. (2014), to consider the operation, as opposed to the creation, of a water management plan. Unlike the Amended Plan, an ARP is not akin to a proposed water rule or regulation, and the court is not required to stay operation of an ARP until all challenges are resolved. The water court further observed that, given that replacement plans are created on an annual basis, to stay the effect of an ARP until all challenges are resolved would render operation of the Amended Plan impossible. Â¶15Â Â Â Â Â Â Second, Supporters moved to dismiss ten of Objectorsâ challenges to the 2012 ARP under C.R.C.P. 12(b)(5) on grounds that the water court and this court had already decided these issues. The water court partially granted and partially denied the motionÂ in an order dated August 10, 2012. It ruled that the law of the case doctrine prevented Objectors from raising challenges that the 2010 Decree and San Antonio, 270 P.3d at 930â31, had resolved. The water court reasoned that although it had discretion to reconsider its prior rulings under the law of the case doctrine, it was precluded from reconsidering rulings that had been appealed and affirmed. See People v. Roybal, 672 P.2d 1003, 1005 (Colo. 1983). The court then examined Objectorsâ ten challenges and dismissed eight of them in whole or in part. Specifically, the water court dismissed all claims that contested the methodology approved in the 2010 Decree and San Antonio, 270 P.3d at 931â32. Â¶16Â Â Â Â Â Â At the time of trial, only two issues remained: (1) whether water produced by Closed Basin Project wells was an appropriate and suitable source of replacement water in the 2012 ARP to prevent injury to senior water rights; and (2) whether the 2012 ARPâs treatment of augmentation plan wells violated the Amended Plan and 2010 Decree and rendered the 2012 ARP invalid. Following a two-day trial in October 2012, the water court entered its detailed findings of fact, conclusions of law, judgment, and decree on April 10, 2013. Â¶17Â Â Â Â Â Â Relevant here, the water court concluded that Closed Basin Project water was an adequate and suitable source of replacement water in the 2012 ARP to prevent injury to senior water rights. The water court reiterated findings of fact it made in the 2010 Decree regarding the use of water produced by the Closed Basin Project. It observed that it determined in the 2010 Decree that the inclusion of water produced by the Closed Basin Project as part of the Subdistrictâs ARP was âclearly within the scope of the beneficial uses set forth in the Closed Basin Project decree.â The water court concluded that the Subdistrict could use Closed Basin Project water both to meet Rio Grande Compact obligations and to replace injurious depletions from groundwater pumping under the 2012 ARP. Releasing Closed Basin Project water into the Rio Grande makes additional water available for upstream diversion and reduces curtailment of senior surface water rights, thus avoiding or replacing injurious depletions. Â¶18Â Â Â Â Â Â The water court also rejected Objectorsâ contention that water produced from the Closed Basin Project is salvaged from evaporation and evapotranspiration and must be administered within the priority system under this courtâs ruling in Southeastern Colorado Water Conservancy District v. Shelton Farms, Inc., 529 P.2d 1321, 1327 (Colo. 1974), as modified on denial of rehâg (Jan. 20, 1975). The water court reasoned that the Closed Basin Decree specifically found that project wells lower the water table to reduce water losses that would otherwise occur, producing water that would not normally make its way to the Rio Grande. Thus, the water court determined that water produced by the Closed Basin Project is akin to a form of developed water recognized by this court in Shelton Farms; that is, water found âwithin the system, [w]hich would never have normally reached the river or its tributaries.â Id. at 1324. In any event, the water court reasoned that under Closed Basin Landowners Association v. Rio Grande Water Conservation District, a challenge based on Shelton Farms, 529 P.2d at 1327, to the Closed Basin Decreeâs award of a water right for water produced by the reduction of evaporation and evapotranspiration amounted to an improper collateral attack on the Closed Basin Decree. See 734 P.2d 627, 636â37 (Colo. 1987). Â¶19Â Â Â Â Â Â The water court also concluded that the 2012 ARPâs treatment of augmentation plan wells was appropriate and that its failure to include a list of augmentation plan wells separate from Subdistrict wells, although improper, did not render the 2012 ARP invalid. Â¶20Â Â Â Â Â Â The water court reasoned that its explanation of the term âNon-Benefitted Subdistrict Landâ in the 2010 Decree made clear that Subdistrict landowners with augmentation plan wells may opt out of the provisions of the Amended Plan, but the Amended Plan does not force those users to do so. The water court also recognized that, in the 2010 Decree, the court viewed augmentation plan wells and the land they served in an âeither/orâ context: Either a well and the land it served was part of an augmentation plan, or it was part of the Subdistrict. But this was because, at the time of the 2010 Decree, the court had not been presented with blended circumstances now coming to lightâfor example, wells only partially covered by an augmentation plan, lands served both by augmentation plan wells and non-augmented wells, or farm operators who desired to include all lands, including part of a farm served by augmentation plan wells, in one farm unit for purposes of determining Subdistrict fees. The water court reasoned that allowing these wells into the Subdistrict (and therefore allowing the 2012 ARP to cover their unaugmented pumping) did not violate the 2010 Decree; rather, the 2010 Decree does not preclude the inclusion of the unaugmented portion of the pumping of an augmentation plan well if the well owner desires to be included in the Subdistrict. Â¶21Â Â Â Â Â Â Further, the water court found that, in the 2012 ARP, the Subdistrict included all of the pumping from augmentation plan wells (that is, both the augmented and unaugmented portions) as part of Subdistrict well pumping for purposes of calculating the Subdistrictâs total groundwater consumptive use. The Subdistrict, however, did not include all recharge from these augmentation plan wells when it calculated the Subdistrictâs net groundwater pumping. Thus, although the twenty-plus wells at issue represented a small fraction of the Subdistrict wells, the inclusion of all pumping from augmentation plan wells had the effect of slightly overstating the net groundwater consumptive use due to Subdistrict well pumping (and thus the amount of injurious depletions) that the Subdistrict needed to replace. Thus, the water court found that the 2012 ARP slightly overcompensated the river for well depletions. Â¶22Â Â Â Â Â Â Finally, the water court concluded that the 2012 ARPâs failure to include the required list of augmentation plan wells, although a technical violation of the Amended Plan, did not render the ARP invalid. The water court reasoned that this violation did not interfere with the primary goals of the Amended Planâand that, therefore, the doctrine of substantial compliance should apply. Applying Fabec v. Beck, 922 P.2d 330, 341 (Colo. 1996), the court determined that: noncompliance was minimal; although the failure affected the transparency of the process and the publicâs access to information, it did not impact the Amended Planâs overall objectives; the Subdistrict and the State Engineer made good faith efforts to comply; and the omission did not cause harm. Thus, the water court concluded that the failure to include a separate list of augmentation plan wells did not require invalidation of the 2012 ARP. It ordered theÂ Subdistrict to include the list of augmentation plan wells in all future ARPs and set forth the specific information that this list must contain. The water court denied all other objections to the Subdistrictâs and the State Engineerâs approval of the 2012 ARP. Â¶23Â Â Â Â Â Â Objectors now appeal from the water courtâs August 2012 orders and the April 2013 ruling upholding the 2012 ARP.