The Pagosa Area Water and Sanitation District (PAWSD) and San Juan Water Conservancy (SJWCD) boards of directors discussed the possibility of cooperating on completing a final lease for the Weber family at the Running Iron Ranch at recent meetings.
The potential cooperation on finalizing a lease that would conclude the Webers’ occupancy and use of the property comes at a time where the boards are currently in litigation over PAWSD’s efforts to sell the ranch over the objections of the SJWCD.
Following an executive session at the Jan. 30 PAWSD board meeting, District Engineer/Manager Justin Ramsey recommended that the district would need to present the draft lease the board was considering to the SJWCD, which jointly owns the Running Iron Ranch with PAWSD, prior to presenting it to the Webers.
This draft lease provides terms for the Webers’ exit from the property, where they have been grazing cattle and mining for gravel and other rock, and would end on July 31.
It specifies that all agricultural activities on the property must be terminated by the end of the lease period and that reclamation of the mining site should be completed if possible, although it leaves open the possibility that the Webers could be granted access to the site after the end of the lease to complete reclamation.
PAWSD board member Glenn Walsh moved to direct staff to provide the draft of the lease extension to the SJWCD and to the Webers for their review and feedback.
At a Feb. 13 PAWSD board meeting, the board returned to discussing the lease as part of conversation about the future of the board’s Running Iron Ranch subcommittee.
During a dispute about communication between the two boards, SJWCD president Candace Jones stated that she would take the lease to her board for consideration, although she commented that she felt the lease was “a little disingenuous” given the uncertainties about the outcome of the litigation between the districts.
Following more disputes and the reiteration of grievances about the SJWCD’s reservoir project and PAWSD’s actions, Ramsey proposed that the subcommittee be tasked with working with the SJWCD to determine how maintenance on the property, including repairing fences and maintaining irrigation infrastructure, will occur.
Walsh, who serves on the subcommittee along with PAWSD board member Bill Hudson, stated that he would be “happy” to work on this issue and that it might be a first step to improving the relationship between the districts.
PAWSD board member Gene Tautges commented that he understood that the costs of maintenance on the property would be split based on the districts’ respective percentage ownership of the property.
Walsh stated that he felt that the districts could come to a “common-sense” agreement on this issue.
Tautges emphasized his desire to obey the terms of the three-way agreement between PAWSD, SJWCD and the Colorado Water Conservation Board governing the management of the ranch and the reservoir project, and added that splitting the costs by ownership percentage “sure is common sense.”
Walsh commented that the agreement is short and that “a lot of the open areas in that agreement just do have to be filled in with some common sense and maybe just four people walking around on the property, noting the problems and then sitting down and discussing what’s the fair-minded way to deal with the problem, and I’m pretty confident we could do that and that’s actually a nice task to actually focus on rather than years of court battles and stuff like that.”
Tautges asked Jones if this arrangement would be acceptable to the SJWCD board.
Jones stated that the issue would be on the agenda at the SJWCD’s next meeting and noted that the Webers have been doing this work, but that PAWSD decided to try to terminate their lease as part of its efforts to sell the property.
At the Feb. 17 SJWCD board meeting, Jones explained Ramsey’s proposal and the events of the Feb. 13 PAWSD meeting to the board.
Jones added that she is aware that Kathy Weber would be interested in running cattle on the property for the summer of 2025, although whether this would be feasible or not would need to be discussed with PAWSD.
She noted that “trying to do this round-robin where paper gets tossed over the fence is not very efficient.”
Jones stated that Walsh and Hudson appeared to be willing to work on the issue, and added that she would like to inform PAWSD that the SJWCD would like to discuss the issues with the lease through the Running Iron Ranch subcommittee and its SJWCD counterpart.
She added that she would “encourage” involving Weber in this discussion to see what opportunities there might be for running her cattle on the ranch in the summer.
The board then unanimously voted to have the issue discussed further through the districts’ subcommittees for the Running Iron Ranch.
josh@pagosasun.com
