LURLINE UNDERBRINK CURRAN
P.0. BOX 1270
KREMMLING, CO. 80459

970-724-3714
October 30, 2017

 

Mr. Robert Kennedy, Jr.
President

Waterkeeper Alliance

180 Maiden Lane, Suite 603
New York, NY. 10038

Re: Windy Gap Firming Project
Dear Mr. Kennedy:

I am skeptical that you will ever see this letter but hold out hope that your staff will share it with
you. I have always been an admirer of you and your family and their efforts in ?nding the facts
of an issue and then acting. The leaders of the effort to stop the Windy Gap Firming Project have
used your name speci?cally in their press release. I am disappointed that the Waterkeeper
Alliance has chosen to join the opposition of the Windy Gap Firming Project without soliciting
information from those most affected and who have worked years to secure mitigation and
enhancements that not only protect the Colorado River for the future but improve it.

First, I would like to introduce myself and explain why this project, and more Speci?cally the
agreements and local permits that accompanied its approval, are important. I worked for Grand
County, Colorado for 33 years, retiring in 2015 but continue to volunteer my time to assist in the
implementation of the assets that were gained due to the Windy Gap Firming Project. Before my
retirement, I was Grand County?s manager and lead negotiator not only on the Windy Gap
Project but also on Denver?s Moffat Expansion Project. These negotiations took over eight years
to complete with Grand County and its partners receiving hard fought and important concessions
that will improve our rivers and sustain our future.

Grand County is the most impacted county in Colorado from transmountain diversions and these
diversions have had serious impacts on the Colorado River and its tributaries over the decades
they have been in place. Grand County, with its? population of 14,000, spent of its
taxpayer?s funds to determine, scienti?cally, what the rivers needed to be healed. This resulted in
the Grand County Stream Management Plan and was used to negotiate agreements and permits
for the Windy Gap Pinning Project as well as the Moffat Expansion Project.

The Windy Gap Firming Project, unlike other previous transmountain diversions, has resulted in
unprecedented concessions that will improve the Colorado River and re-establish seriously

damaged or destroyed aquatic environments while providing ?ows ONLY to be used for the
environment. In addition, Grand County and Colorado Parks and Wildlife receive money to
improve the stream channels which will support lesser ?ows while restoring habitat and
improving temperature and sediment transport above and below the Windy Gap Reservoir. In
addition, an adaptive management plan, called Learning by Doing, has been put in place to
assure that the enhancements and mitigation are doing what was intended, and if not, changes
can be made. This does not happen in the traditional EIS and Record of Decision process. In
these processes, once mitigation has been applied, if it does not work, too bad. No going back
and correcting.

However, the most important component and the pin to the improvements above and
below the Windy Gap Reservoir is the Windy Gap Bypass. This project will remove the Windy
Gap Reservoir from and on channel diversion to off channel and re-establish the natural river
function thereby restoring ?sh migration and natural river ?mction.

When the Windy Gap Reservoir came on line in 1980?s, there was an abundance of giant
stone?y (Pteronarcys califomica) and native molted sculpin in the Colorado River both above
and below the reservoir. These two species are essential to a trout ?shery, which was also
spectacular in the Colorado River at that time. In the years following the Windy Gap Reservoir
construction, the two species have all but disappeared from Windy Gap Reservoir the con?uence
of the Blue River with the Colorado River, approximately 33 river miles. Above the Windy Gap
Reservoir, they are still present. The Windy Gap Bypass Partnership has collected towards
a project to move this reservoir off-line, work that according to one of our biggest grants,
must be completed by 2021. Any lawsuit that delays or stops this work is a detriment to the
Colorado River. If the Windy Gap Project does not go forward, the hard-won concessions
evaporate, and the Colorado River will continue to degrade. Those who oppose this project offer
no solutions to an already critical situation.

I would love an Opportunity to sit down with you and your staff to discuss the full range of
mitigations and enhancements that have been secured with the approval of this project, and
would, at my own expense, travel to New York to do so. It is important that you have the full

facts of this project before you support an effort to undo and destroy what cannot be
accomplished without the project.

Thank you for your time and I look forward to the opportunity to discuss this with you.

Sincerely,

Lurline Underbrink Curran