skip to main content
skip to newscasts

Tuesday, April 23, 2024

Public News Service Logo
facebook instagram linkedin reddit youtube twitter
view newscast page
play newscast audioPlay

Biden administration moves to protect Alaska wilderness; opening statements and first witness in NY trial; SCOTUS hears Starbucks case, with implications for unions on the line; rural North Carolina town gets pathway to home ownership.

view newscast page
play newscast audioPlay

The Supreme Court weighs cities ability to manage a growing homelessness crisis, anti-Israeli protests spread to college campuses nationwide, and more states consider legislation to ban firearms at voting sites and ballot drop boxes.

view newscast page
play newscast audioPlay

Wyoming needs more educators who can teach kids trade skills, a proposal to open 40-thousand acres of an Ohio forest to fracking has environmental advocates alarmed and rural communities lure bicyclists with state-of-the-art bike trail systems.

CO River: Balancing Demands, Protecting Recreation

play audio
Play

Monday, May 16, 2011   

GLENWOOD SPRINGS, Colo. - 'Tis the season - for river recreation, that is. And the Interior Department is working with seven Western states to make sure the Colorado River is protected for multiple uses. Their goal is to balance the sometimes competing needs for water - between agriculture, tourism and recreation interests on the Western Slope and drinking water demands for Front Range metropolitan areas like Denver.

Nathan Fey is director of the American Whitewater Colorado River Stewardship program. He says that balance is important, because a robust Colorado is a huge draw for tourists.

"Recreation relies on variability in flows, and it relies on river health. People who raft the upper Colorado, for example, they don't really want the Disneyland experience."

Fey says commercial rafting alone is a $150-million industry annually in Colorado - stretching over nine months of the year. The Interior Department study will analyze water use in the basin and develop a long-term conservation and resource use strategy.

Fishing is another major source of tourism. Guide Jeff Dysart, general manager of Alpine Angling and Roaring Fork Anglers, says fly fishers come from as far away as South Africa to pursue Colorado trout. He does not want to see another winter like this past year, when the river slowed to a trickle due to repairs at the Shoshone hydroplant.

"There were places on the river where I could see 20 or 30 yards of river bed that was high and dry. I have no doubt that, with the reduced flows, we lost a year-class of spawning. The eggs and the baby fish froze to death."

Fey would love to see the Colorado receive the protections afforded by Wild and Scenic River designation - but he also knows that isn't a realistic goal, given Colorado's history.

"A Wild and Scenic designation, if there was a federal water right associated with that, would be so junior under Colorado water law that it would really fail to do anything to protect in-stream flows."





get more stories like this via email

more stories
Several Mississippi correctional facilities offer both short-term (12 weeks) and long-term (six months) alcohol and drug programs with individual and group counseling for treating alcohol and drug addictions. (Wesley JvR/peopleimages.com)

Social Issues

play sound

Mississippi prisons often lack resources to treat people who are incarcerated with substance-use disorders adequately but a nonprofit organization is …


Social Issues

play sound

April is Second Chance Month and many Nebraskans are celebrating passage of a bipartisan voting rights restoration bill and its focus on second chance…

Health and Wellness

play sound

New Mexico saw record enrollment numbers for the Affordable Care Act this year and is now setting its sights on lowering out-of-pocket costs - those n…


Migrants are put on buses from Texas to other states, often without knowing where they are going. (afishman64/Adobe Stock)

Social Issues

play sound

The future of Senate Bill 4 is still tangled in court challenges. It's the Texas law that would allow police to arrest people for illegally crossing …

Social Issues

play sound

Residents in a rural North Carolina town grappling with economic challenges are getting a pathway to homeownership. In Enfield, the average annual …

Social Issues

play sound

A new poll finds a near 20-year low in the number of voters who say they have a high interest in the 2024 election, with a majority saying they hold …

Social Issues

play sound

A case before the U.S. Supreme Court could have implications for the country's growing labor movement. Justices will hear oral arguments in Starbucks …

 

Phone: 303.448.9105 Toll Free: 888.891.9416 Fax: 208.247.1830 Your trusted member- and audience-supported news source since 1996 Copyright © 2021