What is it about?
Water is a scarce resource in the arid western United States. Over the years, most western states have developed similar management systems called the Doctrine of Prior Appropriation. This paper explains how one western state, Colorado, has developed a unique interpretation of the Doctrine of Prior Appropriation in which significant administrative authority is vested in the Water Courts operating in parallel to Colorado's normal civil and criminal courts.
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Why is it important?
Understanding the laws of physics is not enough to understand water management in the arid western United States, because water management is also constrained by the laws of men and women. Knowing the history, context, and operation of water management in Colorado is essential for water projects in that state, and serves as an informative case study for water management in other states.
Perspectives
Many of the ideas in this paper originated in the doctoral dissertation of first author Bill McIntyre, who spent 30 years working at Colorado's Office of the State Engineer before starting his last round of graduate study here at the University of Colorado Denver. In contrast, this is my first publication related to water law, so I certainly learned a great deal in the process of writing, editing, and publishing this work.
David Mays
University of Colorado Denver
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: Roles of the Water Court and the State Engineer for water administration in Colorado, Water Policy, April 2017, IWA Publishing,
DOI: 10.2166/wp.2017.145.
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