Opinion ID: 2621725
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Early Developments

Text: {3} The pueblo of Nuestra Senora de Las Dolores de Las Vegas was established on the Gallinas River by a colonization grant from the Republic of Mexico on March 23, 1835. See Maese v. Herman, 183 U.S. 572, 573-76, 22 S.Ct. 91, 46 L.Ed. 335 (1902). After settlement, the Town of Las Vegas became a part of the United States with the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo in 1848. See Treaty of Peace Between the United States and Mexico, Feb. 2, 1848, U.S.-Mex., 9 Stat. 922. Congress confirmed the grant to the Town in 1860, and the Town received a patent from the United States government in 1903. In addition, the Legislature established a board of trustees that would have the power of control and management of the tract of land known as the Las Vegas land grant. NMSA 1978, § 49-6-2 (1909). The Legislature established the board as a separate legal entity from the Town of Las Vegas, see City of Las Vegas v. Oman, 110 N.M. 425, 428, 796 P.2d 1121, 1124 (Ct.App.1990), which had only the authority specifically delegated by statute. Among other things, the Legislature authorized the board to lease, sell or mortgage any part or parts of said tract of land, without prejudice to any vested rights to land within the grant. NMSA 1978, §§ 49-6-9 (1903), -10 (1909). {4} Separately from the settlement under the 1835 colonization grant, a settlement on the east side of the Gallinas was established in 1841. This settlement, known as the City of Las Vegas, expanded dramatically after the arrival of the railroad in 1879. In 1880, San Miguel County issued a fifty-year franchise to Agua Pura Co. to provide municipal water to the inhabitants of the two settlements. See Cartwright v. Pub. Serv. Co. of N.M., 66 N.M. 64, 72, 343 P.2d 654, 659-60 (1958). In 1970, a consolidation of the two separate settlements, the Town of Las Vegas and the City of Las Vegas, formed the current City of Las Vegas. {5} Water rights on the Gallinas have been the subject of a number of judicial and administrative proceedings. While these proceedings are described in greater detail in Oman, 110 N.M. at 428-29, 796 P.2d at 1124-25, we will review some of the more important developments. In 1921, the district court of San Miguel County entered a decree, known as the Gallinas Decree, in a consolidated suit brought by various water users. The decree adjudicated a water right to the land grant board based on a permit issued by the State Engineer with a priority date of 1909. Agua Pura Co. was not a party to the Gallinas Decree. In 1933, in an attempt to adjudicate all surface water rights on the Gallinas, the federal district court entered a decree which is known as the Hope Decree. Among other water rights, the Hope Decree adjudicated the right of New Mexico Power Co., the successor of Agua Pura Co., to 2600 acre feet per year with an 1881 priority.