HomeMy WebLinkAbout1985 Ordinance No. 005I
OROINI\ICE NO . 5
SERIES OF 198_5 __
BY /\U'l'HORl'l'Y
COUNCIL BILL NO . 7
IN'l'ROOOCED BY COUNCIL
MEMBER BILD
/IN ORDINANCE APPROVING THE DISSOLUTION OF THE 'l'RI-CI'l'Y '!'RUST
ORIG INALLY CREATED BY DENVER , ENGLEl'/000 /IND LITI'LETON FOR PURCHASE
OF SENIOR W/\'l'ER RIGHTS ON SOllrH PLATI'E RIVER.
WHERE/IS , the Tri-Ci ty Trust was orig inally created by Denver ,
Engle;.oocl and Littleton for the purchase of senior water rights o n
the South Platte Ri ver between Ala'Tle:l a Avenue and the entrance to
1-later ton canyon in the 1950 's; and
WHEREAS, Wnen Denver took over Littleton • s water sys tan ,
Littleton I s share \>.ent to the Denver t-Jater Board ; and
WHERE/IS , Denver and Engle;.oocl now ag ree tha t i t ;.oul<l be
mutually advantageous to dissolve the 'l'r 1st so that e ach can
procee:l to use their respective water ri']hts as they see fit ;
and ,
WHEREAS , t he En<J l ewood \'later and Sewer lloacd recommended at
their Decanber 11 , 1984 meeting that Counci l approve the Tri-City
Trust Disso lut ion as presented i n the attached report SLmTiary ;
NO,ol, 11iEREFORE , BE r·r ORIJAINED BY '!'HE c 1•ry COUNC IL OF '11iE
CITY OF ENGLEl'/000 , COLORl\00 , AS FOLLO;IS:
Sect ion l. Ci ty Co un cil hereby approves the bas is of dissolution
presentoo in the r e port entitled "Tri-City Trust Dissolution Denve r
Wate r Depa rtmen t and City of Ehgle;.ood ."
Section 2 . City Council a uthorizes the Kayc e to vote for the
d1ssoluffon of the Tri-City Trust on the basis presented in the
above mentioned report at the next meeting o[ the Tri-C i ty '!'rust .
I ntroduced , read in full , and passed on first r eading on the
7th day of January , 1985 .
'1,hl ished as a Bill for an Ordinance or, tl v , 9 '·11 day o f
Ja nuar , 1985 .
Read by title and passed on final r ead ing on the 21st day of
J a nuary , 1985 .
Published by t i t le as ordi nance No.
the 23rd day of J a nuary , 1985 .
Atte st :
5 , Series of 1985 , on
~,,{!Ot; ~neC Ot i s , Mayor
I, Gary R. Hi gbee , e ,. offic io City Clerk-Tr easur e r of the City
of Engle"'°od , Colorado , here by cer d fy t ha t the above and foregoing
is a true , accurate and canpl ete copy of the Ordinance passed on
final r eading and published by title as ordinance No . 5 , Series
of i n s. ---
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TRI-CITY TRUST DISSOLUTION
DENVER WATER DEPARTMENT
AND
CITY OF ENGLEWOOD
by
J . Patrick Qui nla n
Edwin D. J ames
DENVE R WATER DEPARTMENT
Ronald K. Blatchley
BLATCHLEY ASSOCIATES. IN C .
Nove mber 1984
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TA BLE OF CONTENT S
1 . J NTRODU CT J ON
IJ. RIGHTS ...
JJ J.
JV.
Fi gu res
Ta bles
DIT CH CONSUMPTIVE USf
A. Brown Dit ch ........ .
B. Epperson Di tch ...... .
C. Nev ada 01 tch . . . . . . . .
D. La st Chance Di t ch Co . No . 2.
E . Cit y Ditch
DIVIS ION OF RI GH TS ....•
Figure 1. Hi s t o ri c Str aigh t Lin e Di agram .
Ta b le 1. Av era ge Poten t ia l Cons umptiv e
Use Req uirement Fo r Six Cr o ps
1911 -19 50 Bro wn Dit ch ....
Appe nd i xes
Ap pe nd x A -Br own Study ...
Appen d x B -Eppe r s on St ud y ..
Append x C -Nevada St uay ...
App e nd x D -Last Chance Stuoy
Appe nd XE -City Study ..
4
7
10
12
1 7
19
22
23
Bei ge
Orange
Yello w
Blue
Red
• TRI-C H Y TR ,ST DISSOLUTION
INTRODUCTION
The Tri-City Tr us t was created on June 3, 1956 by Denver , Englewood , and
Littleton for the purchase of senior water rights on the South Platte Ri ver
be ween Alameda Avenue and the entr anc e to Wate rton Canyon.
Water r ight s were purchased by each city and delive r ed to the Trust, which
held title to the '.g ht s . As the rights wer e delivered an accoun t wa s
e stablished each city fo r value rece ived, and credit was given as a
percent age (If tGta l assets. Additionally , a cash account was established
• as a pu ~has i ng fund. Cities received credit for ca sh depositet' with the
fund. No water has been purchased s ince Aug ust of 1962.
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In 1963 an a udit , done by McM,· o.-i,<a ... x and Rodriquez, wa s mace of the
assets ano the pe rcentage of o, •,,1,ni; :r each ci t y was established as
f ollows.
~
Li ttletcn
Den,er
Englewoo c
Percentage of Owner snip
of Trust 's Ass ets
42.1 624
'7 .1180
20 . 7196
100.0000
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lr 1970 Denve r ac quired all wate r rights of the clly of Littl eton,
inc luding its interest in the Tri-City Trust, when a total service contract
was exe cu t ed.
Since 1963 , several me e tings have been held to discuss the llissolution of
the Tru s t and to distribute the asset s . A method of di s t ributing the
asse t s has been difficult t o identify because of the complexity of
eval uat.l ng the wate r right s for future use. Neither Englewood nor Denver
was an xious to acquire a right that wa s of questi onable or uncertain
usefulness. Another factor complic ating the distr ibution was the
aw kwardness of Denver and Englewood potentially acquiring appr oximately 79%
and 21%, respectively, of eac h right owned by the Trus t. Operationally,
ea ch city wo uld much r ather work with one or tw o ditches than wit h five
ditches which would actua lly entail the use of proport i'Jnate sh ares of ten
different wate r rig',ts.
On Decembe r 15 , 1983 the Tr ustees directed the eng i neer s of Den ve r an d
Englewood t o determi ne the best method of trans fe r of the water right s of
t he Tr ust . The engineers agreed that the mos t exp ed itious ana f ai r met~od
available would be t o qua ntify the historic al conslJl'!)tive use of irr i ,ation
water of the rights. Then di s ributi on would pr oceed based on a 79/21
spli t accordin~ to consurnt:t:ve us e of irriga t ior, wat e r , with he intention
t hat the right s t hemselves would remain as whol e as poss i ble. The or,e
ex ce ption would be if it were necessa ry t o divide one of t he r i ghts in
orde r to make the entire distribut ion equal to an ov erall 79/21 spli .
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RIGHTS
The Tri-City Tr ust, i n its short life , pu rchased rights in five different
ditches, totaling 24.653 cubic feet pe r second (cfs). (See Fi gu r e 1 for a
brief familiari zation of the ditch loc ations .) As of Fe brua r y 1984 , t he
Tr ust has title to the foll owin g rights:
Last Chanc e Ditch No. 2
Nev ad a
Brown
Eppe rson
City
Trust Ownership
Shares or Inche s Oi version Rate
9. 712 shares 1.265 c fs
29.33 sha r es 7 .038 c fs
518 .10 inches 13.438 cfs
86 .40 inches 2.25 cf s
25.43 inches 0.662 cfs
24.653 cfs
Ea ch of t hese rights has been used histori ca lly for irrigation , dor.,estic
and municipal use, or all three . However, some of the record keeping has
ber,n po or or none,.stent , and in the case of t ~e ditcn companies, it has
bee n difficult, if not impo s sible , t o con ne ct actual shares or inches to a
parcel of land, crops and a histor ic consunptive use nunbe r. Each ditc h
has its o•n unique history and analytical problems . Hence, ea ch ditch was
examined individually and ana ly zed acc o rdi~ o the most practical and
accepta ble method. Each ditch is discussed in the following section .
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• lt is recorrmended that 42.6 /JF of historic consurrp t.(ve use of
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irrigation water for the City Ditch be used for dissolution or the
Tri-City Trus t.
DIVISIO N OF RI GHTS
The cons umptive use of irrJgation water attributed to the Tr i -City Trust
righ ts has been evaluated, and the f ollowing estimates of hist oric
consum;itive use of irrigation water s hould be used for division of the
wa ter ri9~ts presently owned by t he Tri-City Trust.
Ditch Cons~tive Use in Acre-Fe et Per Year
Ep person Oi tch 284 . 2
Brown Ditch 207 .4
Nevada Oitch 507.2
Last Chance Ditch 15 7. 5
City Ditch ~
Total 11 98 . 9
rt-~ Brown u!.tch should not be divided at t ni s time. The prOduc ti vit y o
the Bro wn ~itch dep end s on revi ew ing the municipal and irrigati on uses of
t he ditch or transfe r ring the his t oric consumpt ive use to Den ver ano
Engle wood intak e structures. Neither propositi on coulo be accorrp lisheo
withi n the time frame des i red for dissol ution o f t he Trust. For t his
reason, the Tr ust sho uld be dissolved by placi ng the Brown Oitch in a 79 /21
joint ownersh i p by Engle wood and Denver and dividi ng the Last Chance,
• Nev ada , City ano Eppcrson Oitch rights as follow s:
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Pa rt icipant ~
De nver Ep pe rson Ditch
La s t Cha nce Ditch
Ne vada Di t ch
Subtotal
Englewood City Ditch
Nevada Ditch
Subtotal
Total
Proposed Ownership
Hi s t oric
CU in /lF /yr Share s/I~
284 .2 86.40 inches
157 .5 9 .712 sha r es
~ 19 .92 shares
78 6. l
42 .6 25.43 i nches
~ 9. 41 sha r es
205.4
99 1. 5
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2.25
Remarks
entire
ownership
1 . 265 e nti re
owne rship
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8. 255
D.662 entire
owne rship
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2.960
11. 215
This division wou l d be consistent with the 79/21 s~li t, ana it wo uld also
have t he advantage ~f l eav ing the Epper son Ditch intac t. Engle wood owns
the City Ditch he adga te and ditch do wn t o Har vard Gulch an d is de sirous of
obtaining ad dit i on a l contract water . ( It should be noted that when t he
s tructur e was deeded ov er to Engl ew ood in the contract dated Februar y 6 ,
1970, Eng lewood was limited to obtaining a ma ximum of 2 .2~ c f s of cont r act
wate r. The acquisition of the Tri -City Tr ust i rches •ill oring their
holdings to 2.6522 c fs, requ iring a modificatio11 of lt.e ori ginal ag r eement
between Engl ewood and Denver . )
This study has Quan tified t he hi storic consul1'!)tive use of i rri gation water
which in our combined opinions would be transferaole i n water cou rt
proc 0 edings . Many a ssun pti ons wer e mad e and gen erali zations utili ze d t o
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• arrive at thes e nunbers, but t here is a dearth of data in this area and
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what wa s available was us ed . lt is unlikely that material dJrferences
would be found with more research. It ls reasonable to expect that
significant funds would be required f or tra,,s fer or chang e 111 use, which i n
our opinion would have the same end result as to allowable future
consunpti ve use. It is our combined reconrnendation that the se nUTiber s be
utilized for disso lution of, the Trust .
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• FIGURE 1
HISTORIC STRAIGHT LINE DIAGRAM
PLA'fl"E
RIVER
9 .5 c., >-;.
¢.,
"c ~
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Table I
Average Potential Consumptive Use Requirement
For Six Cro ps 191 1 -1950 Brown Ditch
Average Number of Potential C. U.
CrQR A~t~au~~ Y;~t§ IJf ~iiti! A,,;-F~iH /A,t~
Pa s tur e Gras s 20 3 l. 73
Alfalfa 70 39 l. 9 5
Orch ar d 8 4 l. 66
Su9a r Beets 20 11 l. 61
Garden (Small Ve g e t1h 'cs) 64 28 . 97
Cere als 61 31 J. 24
Average unit c~nsumptive use of irrigation wa ter l. 46
acr e -feet /Acre
The ave rag e unit consumptive use requirement fer all the crops
f o r the Brown Ditch analysis was calculated by add ing the
entire consumptive use f o r all crops f o r the 40 -year study
peri od and di vi d 'ng it by the total amount of ac res irri g ated
in those 40 years .
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