Half of the water used in Colorado is used inside the home and half outside. Inside, though, only about 5 percent is completely consumed, unable to be reused, while outside approximately 75 percent of lawn water is gone for good./ Photo by Steve Eginoire

On tap for the session

Local senator’s legislation looks at cutting lawn size as conservation tool

by Tracy Chamberlin

It was her first of the year. Before any committees convened or bills were blasted on the floor, every senator introduced one piece of legislation on the first day of the legislative session in Denver.

Sen. Ellen Roberts, R-Durango, chose to present her colleagues with SB-17. 

Aimed at water conservation, it limits the amount of lawn grass on new residential lots that are both built after January 2016 and get at least some of their water from agriculture. “It’s a step we can take right away,” she said about the bill.

According to the number crunchers, half of the water used in Colorado is used inside the home and half outside. The difference is the amount that’s used up.

Inside, only about 5 percent is completely consumed, unable to be reused, while outside approximately 75 percent of lawn water is gone for good. This is one reason Roberts and those who helped her craft SB-17 think lawn irrigation is a good candidate for conservation policies.

The bill defines the limit on lawn grass at 15 percent of the aggregate acreage of all the residential lots in the development, leaving room for the builders to have some lots with a higher percentage and others with less.

It would not affect existing lots and does not apply to parks, common areas or xeriscaping. Nor does it affect lawns using raw water for irrigation. It also leaves the details up to local governments, tasking them with adopting enforceable resolutions that define these limits as a requirement for the approval of new developments. If passed, the law would not take effect until Jan. 1, 2016, giving projects already under way time for completion.

The trigger for limiting the lawn size would be the water source. If the new development gets all or part of its supply from water that was tagged for agricultural irrigation purposes but later changed over to municipal or domestic use, the bill would come into play. If not, then there would be no limit. 

The practice is commonly called “buy-up and dry-up,” when agricultural water rights are purchased, transferred to municipal use through a water court and then used for things like lawn irrigation.

“We move it away from food production,” Roberts said, “... that’s a concern.”

The bill does not put any restraints or limits on farmers and ranchers who want to sell their agricultural water rights. It only comes into effect for municipalities when those rights are used to water the lawns in residential developments built after the 2016 deadline.

In the past few years, Steve Harris, a member of the Interbasin Compact Committee, a group tasked with discussing water issues among those living in the state’s river basins, said he’s often heard members and others lamenting over the amount of agricultural dry up that’s occurring in the state.

The consultant and water engineer, who’s been in business for 30 years in Southwest Colorado, said he is not against the practice, acknowledging that there is a place for it. But after more than a decade the state’s agriculture is at risk. “This doesn’t stop it, it just reduces it,” he added.

Part of the concern for water experts comes from a looming gap between future supply and demand in the state. Population pundits predict that Colorado will see its citizenry double over the next 35 years, and those residents will have a need for both agricultural and municipal water.

Last year, Colorado Gov. John Hickenlooper attempted to face that future head on by issuing an executive order to create the Colorado Water Plan, a draft of which is expected by year’s end. The governor’s order acknowledged an imminent gap between the future supply and demand of water, not just for Coloradans but for the 18 states downstream that the Rocky Mountain headwaters feed.

That combined with more than a decade of drought conditions and a chorus of stakeholders, representing municipal, agricultural, recreational and tourism interests, prompted the need for a statewide water plan.

Bruce Whitehead, executive director for the Southwest Water Conservation District and one of the individuals who helped Roberts craft the bill, thinks it has a good chance at passage, but acknowledges that it’s going to be tough.

Opposition is expected to come primarily from home builders and local municipalities, particularly those along the Front Range. It’s that area of the state that will feel the impacts of this bill initially because the “buy-up and dry-up” practice is more common in that highly-populated region.

This fact has also prompted some to frame the bill as a battle between the Front Range and the Western Slope.

Harris and Roberts admit that only a few communities will feel the punch; however, they insist the bill is not intended to pit the two regions against one another. They added that this is a statewide bill and applies equally to everyone.

Roberts said this type of mandate is not easy for her, either. She sympathizes with those who object to being told how much lawn they can have on their own private property. “We are facing a drought,” she added, “and we have to deal with that.”

Roberts called the bill a work in progress, recognizing and welcoming those who want to add their voices to the conversation.

Neither Roberts, Whitehead, nor Harris see this particular bill as the answer to future water worries. It’s simply one way to start to make a difference. “It’s going to jump start that conversation about water conservation,” Whitehead said.