Water Right Current Issues

This page is intended as a space to present various notices to the public which are outside the scope of the specific section navigation menus.

05/30/2008 Water Issues Task Force Meetings: * Treatment of Change Applications in Various States* Use Preferences in 17 Prior Appropriation States* Survey of Wester States' Change Application Status

05/09/2008 The Utah Division of Water Rights has scheduled training sessions for professionals who prepare Proofs of Beneficial Use. The training session will be presented in each region to help ensure that anyone interested has the opportunity to attend. Click here to view the training schedule

04/07/2008 Proof Professionals Survey A survey for professional engineers and land surveyors who prepare Proofs of Beneficial Use.

02/4/2008 Draft Administrative Procedures for Statement of Sole Supply Forms are drafted and submitted for approval. MCL/BS

08/20/2007 Administrative rules for Distribution Systems and Water Commissioners (R655-15). Draft Date 07/25/2007

08/01/2007 Revised administrative rules for Geothermal Energy Wells (R655-1) and Administrative Proceedings on Water Rights Commenced Prior to January 1988 (R655-2) have been published for comment in Vol. 2007, No. 15.

07/01/2007 The Division of Water Rights will no longer accept any Report of Water Right Conveyance that propose title update on more than one water right number. A complete Report of Water Right Conveyance, including all supporting documentation, must be submitted for EVERY water right number requiring title update.

06/01/2007 Snake Valley - Nevada SNWA project Developments Southern Nevada Water Authority is pursuing a project to export groundwater from Eastern Nevada to the Las Vegas area. Some of the groundwater basins targeted by the project are connected to Utah groundwater basins. A ground-water study called BARCASS of the area was released June 1, 2007. Utah and Nevada pursuant to Federal legislation are in the process of developing an agreement which divides ground-water resources of the basin between the two states.

06/30/2007 The US Forest Service is taking comment on a proposal to designate river segments in Utah as wild and scenic. Click to view a map of the The Wild & Scenic Rivers Suitability Study or visit their website.

04/18/2007 Nonuse of water and other Municipal Water Rights Issues
Jerry Olds, State Engineer made a presentation to the Natural Resources Interim Committee inviting them to investigate issues related to nonuse of water (forfeiture) and other Municipal Water Right issues with the expectation that legislation be developed which would provide the State Engineer additional guidance in these areas.

03/19/2007 The Utah State Engineer has started the process to create a groundwater management plan for the Beryl / Enterprise area. The first public meeting was held soliciting public interacting in the process. Data and notice of any other public meetings will be posted on the Beryl / Enterprise Groundwater Management Plan website.

09/14/2006 The United States Congressional Budget Office has released the report How Federal Policies Affect the Allocation of Water. The Utah Division of Water Rights does not endorse the views set forth in the report. A reference is provided here for public information and to stimulate dialog on the subject.

During February 2006 the Division modified it's data structure and presentation of water right uses. Notable in the process is a centeralized ability to group all water rights which share a use and assign a sole supply to each right for the use. This structural change corrects a long standing shortcoming in the automated records system which allowed "rights in common" and now called supplemental rights to be described on each water right independently resulting in redundant data entry and inconsistencies. All of the existing data was processed into the new system. In some cases the processing was unable to detect inconsistencies and has produced redundant conflicting records. The Division is currently reviewing rights with multiple supplemental groups in an effort to correct this issue. For the time being we are providing an alternative view from the old uses listing for comparision. You access the alternative view from the pulldown menu at the top of each water right.

The Utah Office of the BLM has announced the consolidation of various websites and the return to operation of their main website at www.ut.blm.gov. RMPs, and NEPA actions are now provided through the website.