At recent meetings, the San Juan Water Conservancy District (SJWCD) and the Pagosa Area Water and Sanitation District (PAWSD) took steps towards collaboratively determining the future of management at Running Iron Ranch.
At a March 13 meeting of the PAWSD Board of Directors, board member Bill Hudson stated that the PAWSD Running Iron Ranch subcommittee was hoping to reach out to the SJWCD board members involved in managing the Running Iron Ranch to work on determining next steps for managing the ranch in the near future.
PAWSD board member Glenn Walsh commented that he believed a helpful first step would be to look at conditions on the ranch together with members of the SJWCD board.
He asked PAWSD board chairman Jim Smith to accompany the subcommittee, composed of Hudson and Walsh, given his expertise in ranch management.
Smith replied that he would be willing to go.
Walsh added that such a tour could hopefully occur in the upcoming two weeks.
He commented that there may be such significant issues with fencing and other infrastructure on the ranch that the boards may have to seek professional ranch management to maintain the property.
“I’m better behaved when I’m walking around,” Walsh said.
PAWSD District Manager/Engineer Justin Ramsey presented the board with a bid for removal of a house on the property near U.S. 160.
He explained that the house is currently in poor condition and is causing issues with people living in it without authorization.
PAWSD board member Gene Tautges proposed that, as part of the tour of the ranch, the subcommittee should “get up to date” on insurance for the property and on costs PAWSD has been paying, such as for electricity on the property.
He added that the three-way agreement between PAWSD, the SJWCD and the Colorado Water Conservation Board “pretty clearly states” what costs would be paid by which organization.
As discussed at previous meetings, this proposal would likely involve PAWSD invoicing the SJWCD for costs it claims the SJWCD should have paid.
Walsh proposed that this topic would be more appropriate for a separate subcommittee meeting after the ranch tour.
Tautges commented that he did not want the issue to “fall off the radar.”
At a March 17 SJWCD board meeting, the board also discussed the issue of ranch management, with SJWCD president Candace Jones explaining to the board that she had been trying to communicate with the PAWSD board about leases for the Weber family, the current tenants on the ranch, to keep cattle on the ranch.
She added that she and SJWCD board member Charles Riehm had also spoken with Kathy Weber, who expressed an interest in continuing to run cattle on the ranch during the upcoming summer and a willingness to do repairs on the irrigation ditches and fencing on the property to allow this to happen.
Jones stated that this would benefit the districts by ensuring that someone is performing maintenance on the ranch.
She then recapped the events of the recent PAWSD meeting and that board’s discussion of the ranch.
Jones stated that she believed that PAWSD might be inviting members of the SJWCD board to join its tour of the ranch, but that she was not certain and wanted to discuss the issue with the SJWCD board prior to reaching out to PAWSD to clarify.
SJWCD board member Rob Hagberg noted that Colorado is a fence-out state and asked, if there are no cattle on the ranch, why maintaining the fences would be necessary.
Jones explained that there are cattle on nearby parcels and that, if the fences are not maintained, those cattle could travel through the ranch and reach U.S. 160.
Hagberg commented that this would not be the SJWCD’s responsibility since they would not be the district’s cattle.
Jones stated that the issue needs to be discussed to determine if other cattle being on the ranch would impact the district in any way, including through the cattle consuming water on the property.
“If there’s no value to us, then this is not a hill we need to climb,” Jones said. “If there’s value, then there’s value.”
The board then discussed the value of repairing the ranch fences, with SJWCD board member and former Colorado State University Extension agent Bill Nobles stating that it would not be useful unless the district or a tenant is running cattle on the ranch.
SJWCD board member Susan Nossaman noted that the maintaining the fence is in the interest of the person running cattle, as cattle moving onto the highway and being hit by a car could cause a significant financial loss for their owner.
Nobles added that Colorado being an open range state would reduce the district’s liability if cattle moving through the property reached the highway and were involved in a collision.
Riehm noted that the Colorado Department of Transportation has a responsibility to fence cattle off of the highway since Colorado is a fence-out state.
Jones asked SJWCD legal counsel Jeffrey Kane if the understanding articulated by board members about the need to maintain fencing fit his understanding.
Kane stated that Colorado requires that an owner have a “legal fence” in place to keep livestock out if they wish to charge a neighbor with trespassing for having cattle on their property.
He added that he would also want to consider if other cattle on the ranch could cause damage or lasting harm to the property in any way and to weigh the value of doing incremental fence maintenance versus allowing the fence to fall into disrepair.
Kane also commented that the litigation between the SJWCD and PAWSD over PAWSD’s attempts to sell the ranch could be concluded this year and that the SJWCD might want to graze livestock on the ranch while it continues with project planning.
Nobles commented that he believes that the Webers have likely done no significant fence maintenance in the last 15 years given the number of cattle they run on the property.
He added that the cost of repairing these fences could be between $15,000 and $20,000, with Riehm commenting that the cost could be $30,000.
Jones asked if there would be any incremental value in having the Webers maintain the fences.
“At this point in time, no, because she’s not going to pay you anything,” Nobles said, referring to Kathy Weber. “So, therefore, I kind of shudder to think that they’re going to fix the fence because they haven’t and they leased it forever.”
He added that he would want a written statement that the Webers would fix the fence and an outside assessment of the state of the fences.
Jones commented that the Webers “fixing the fences” would mean propping up the barbed wire that is currently present for another year and correcting some leaning fence posts.
Nobles expressed agreement with this assessment and added, “It’s still not good enough.”
SJWCD board member Joe Tedder stated that the district is also responsible for weed maintenance on the property and that Archuleta County Weed and Pest Supervisor Ethan Proud explained that grazing might help control weeds.
Nobles commented that having no grazing for a few years might not significantly impact weeds, but would likely have benefits on the portions of the land that are currently overgrazed.
The board then debated the issue of grazing and weeds more, with Riehm pointing out that weeds would be likely to grow into trampled areas if no native grasses are seeded.
Nobles noted that the Webers appear to have done no weed treatment on the property for multiple years.
Nobles added that leaving the property without livestock would likely only hurt Kathy Weber by not allowing her to put cows on the property.
Rob Hagberg commented that the district also has a responsibility to prevent invasive species from growing on the property according to state law.
Jones concluded the discussion of weeds by stating that the district would try to have the ranch included on Proud’s weed treatment list and that the primary consideration is if the county would take action against the district due to weeds on the property.
Jones then raised the issue of the demolition of the house on the property, noting that the bid PAWSD received for the demolition of the house fell between $18,000 and $19,000.
Riehm noted that this bid covered a full demolition of the house and that the bid was made by the Webers.
He questioned if a full demolition would be required.
Jones commented that she had not discussed the issue with the PAWSD board, but that the district did need to engage on this question and that she would like to assign future negotiations on this topic to the SJWCD subcommittee covering the ranch.
“We can offer a lot of things, but they need to talk to us,” Jones said. “This we talk about it and then they talk about it and our conversation is one public meeting to the next is just ridiculous and inefficient and ineffective.”
Jones opined that the comments made at PAWSD meetings are “all about baiting us into having a conversation and we should be having that conversation sitting at a table so we can actually make some progress.”
Riehm stated that the SJWCD subcommittee would contact the PAWSD subcommittee and ask for an agenda covering the items the districts need to discuss.
Nobles and Nossaman commented that they believe removing buildings from the property are part of the most recent gravel mining lease the Webers held at the property.
Jones commented that the districts need to look at the leases and determine what the Webers’ responsibilities for removing the buildings might be.
“I thought having this subcommittee was the mechanism that would be effective to do that,” Jones said, referring to discussing issues involving the districts managing the ranch. “Obviously, that’s not gotten traction the way it should have, but we’ll try again with a specific list with a specific response, and whether they want to do it at the board level or the staff level, that’s up to them.”
The board then discussed efforts to have a joint work session with PAWSD, with the board concluding that having a subcommittee meeting could be valuable, but that it should likely not have a work session with the full PAWSD board due to concerns about how a discussion of the ranch sale, which PAWSD wished such a work session to include, could impact the districts’ ongoing litigation.
Jones concluded by stating that she would reach out to the PAWSD board to inform them that the SJWCD board sees value in the subcommittees meeting to discuss management of the ranch and in a potential joint work session to discuss these issues.
The board unanimously voted to approve this course of action.
A work session at the ranch between the two boards took place on March 24 to discuss ranch maintenance and tour the ranch.
josh@pagosasun.com
