Colorado Legislature Protects Existing Recreational Water Rights

On May 25, 2017, the Colorado legislature passed House Bill 17-1990 addressing the 2015 Colorado Supreme Court decision of St. Jude’s Co. v. Roaring Fork Club LLC denying a private club’s ability to obtain an instream water right. Colorado, as a prior appropriation state, requires its water users to demonstrate that the water will be […]

The Colorado Supreme Court recently addressed two previously unsettled issues that will impact other water users in Grand Valley Water Users Ass’n v. Busk-Ivanhoe, Inc., 14SA303 (2016).  First, the Court held that imported transbasin water may not be stored in the basin of import prior to first use unless the decree expressly authorizes it.  The […]