#2 Tips to Implement Requirements in State Statutes
Colorado Revised Statutes now require that municipal, county, and regional comprehensive plans include a water supply element and these elements must be updated, in consultation with water providers, on no less than a 5-year basis. DOLA includes these requirements in grant guidelines.
Background.
DOLA’s Energy/Mineral Impact Assistance Fund Grant guidelines require planning grant recipients to address the community’s water supply and water quality goals. Per Colorado Revised Statutes 30-28-106(3)(a.5)(II) and 31-23-206(1.5)(c), the community must:
- Consult and coordinate with local water provider(s),
- Include water conservation policies, and
- Estimate a range of water supplies and facilities needed to support the potential public and private development described in the comprehensive plan.
Community Water Supply & Water Quality Goals
How to determine your community’s water supply and water quality goals is a locally-driven decision. For examples of goals and objectives, consult Integrating Water Efficiency into Land Use Planning in the Interior West: A Guidebook for Local Planners, Chapter 5, Section b, on drafting water elements.
You may also consider alignment of local goals with the Water Values in the Colorado Water Plan. These values are based on extensive work with stakeholders and include:
- A productive economy that supports vibrant, sustainable cities, agriculture, recreation, and tourism.
- An efficient and effective water infrastructure system.
- A strong environment with healthy watersheds, rivers, streams, and wildlife.
- An informed public with creative, forward-thinking solutions that are sustainable and resilient to changing conditions and result in strong, equitable communities that can adapt and thrive in the face of adversity.
To effectively address your community’s goals, ensure that water goals are part of the evaluation process as you select from strategies to include in your community’s action plan (i.e., policies and programs).
Tip: Know your neighbor/ context for collaboration
Service areas for water providers and land use authorities are not often a one-to-one match. El Paso County developed a Water Master Plan and has approximately 70 water providers and 21,000 wells. The Town of Windsor is served by two special districts and the City of Greeley. The City of Grand Junction partners with surrounding water providers through the Drought Response Information Project.
Engaging with Water Providers
Water providers and planning staff have many demands on their time. It is critical to dedicate some of that limited time to the question of water and land use. Because local governments have authority to decide how they grow and sole discretion to determine whether water supplies are adequate to support new development, local planners in your community carry an important responsibility. Land use decisions in your comprehensive plan and land use codes have significant potential for future additional water savings, particularly if your community is already implementing many post-occupancy water conservation measures, such as conservation-oriented water rates. Coordinated water conservation efforts also have the potential to reduce the need for, cost, and controversy of future infrastructure investments. As noted in the 2023 Colorado Water Plan, “The way Colorado prioritizes water conservation as it grows will affect the environment, wildlife, outdoor recreation, agriculture, economy, and communities. Water conservation and efficiency efforts could reduce future annual water needs by up to 300,000 acre-feet per year by 2050.”
Want to do some background reading before jumping into a collaborative process? A concise set of tips for engaging with water providers can be found under Foundational Activities in Best Practices for Implementing Water Conservation and Demand Management Through Land Use Planning Efforts. You can find a robust case for better collaboration, along with whom to bring together, what to review, what to discuss, and where to go next in Integrating Water Efficiency into Land Use Planning in the Interior West under Getting Started: How to Engage the Process or Lead It (pgs. 35-44).
Including Water Conservation Policies
Many resources exist on water conservation policy opportunities, and several contain helpful checklists or matrices. For a list of resources, visit the Growing Sonoran Institute’s Colorado Growing Water Smart Guidebook (Appendix B: Growing Water Smart Resources, specifically Section 3, pg. 45).
The scope of your community’s comprehensive plan will influence which best management practices may be considered from relevant guidance documents. The Sonoran Institute identified areas of opportunity for integrating water and land use in different stages:
- Visioning and Planning: Establish goals and objectives integrating water and land use planning
- Water-Smart Land Use Policy: Require water conservation & efficiency in building, site, and subdivision design
- Development Review & Collaboration: Ensure efficiency through development review
- Post-Occupancy Efficiency: Encourage property managers to reduce water consumption
Helpful checklists/matrices when considering water conservation policies
Colorado Growing Water Smart: Community Self-Assessment Parts 3-4, pgs. 4-8
- 8/8 pages
- Checklist for information- gathering, includes programs & policies; Responses: Yes, No, Supporting detail
- Helpful for: Staff with limited capacity using this self-assessment to fulfill DOLA’s EIAF grant requirement
- Unique example or detail: Sub-questions with comprehensive plan content categories, adequate water supply, site development standards for water quality, drought policies, rate structuring, and plumbing codes
Best Practices for Implementing Water Conservation and Demand Management Through Land Use Planning Efforts, Section C, pgs. 16-18; Appendix B worksheets
- 3/57 pages
- Checklist of possible best management practices; Responses: In Place, Consider
- Worksheets for screening/selection in Appendix B
- Helpful for: Water providers and planning professionals looking to share a common method for selecting best practices
- Unique example or detail: Emphasis on foundational activities, voluntary programs, and leading by example; Concise examples; Screening tool includes non-land use best practices
Integrating Land Use and Water Management: Planning and Practice pgs. 12-13
- 2/84 pages
- Matrix compares usefulness of tools, practices, and policies for specific water issues, contribution to community goals, and feasibility
- Helpful for: Planners looking for a head start on evaluating the most effective best practices
- Unique example or detail: Incorporates water issues: adequacy, flooding, aging infrastructure, water quality; Community goals: resilience, equity; Total feasibility: magnitude of cost, ease of implementation
Integrating Water Efficiency into Land Use Planning in the Interior West: A Guidebook for Local Planners pgs. 41-43 and 52-54
- 3/285 pages
- Matrix of tools and where they can be implemented: comp plan, zoning regs, subdivision regs, site plan, building code, plumbing code
- Helpful for: Planners looking for water conservation entry points across plans, regulations, codes; Planners with capacity and community interest can read the reference manual
- Unique example or detail: Full document has ideas on process, and a chapter on water elements for comprehensive plans, including goals, objectives, strategies, with CO and CA examples
Identify Sufficient Water Supplies and Facilities
Communities can use a self-assessment to begin a critical look at the water supply and demand status and trends in collaboration with local water providers. This, in conjunction with a review of other plans, such as long-range water supply plans, capital improvement plans, and water efficiency plans, should inform the community’s ability to identify sufficient water supplies and facilities. It is also important to evaluate the community’s current water adequacy and water dedication requirements.
Water adequacy requirements
The Colorado Revised Statutes §29-20-301-306 places the responsibility on local governments to determine whether a development application has successfully demonstrated that it can ensure an adequate water supply defined as “sufficient for build out of the proposed development in terms of quality, quantity, dependability, and availability to provide a supply of water for the type of development proposed, and may include reasonable conservation measures and water demand management measures to account for hydrologic variability.”
Recommendations for creating clear water adequacy requirements can be found in the Sonoran Institute’s Colorado Growing Water Smart Guidebook (pg. 17) and the Water Savings Resource Guide and Model Provisions for the Colorado Headwaters Region (Chapter 2, pg. 19), among other sources.
Water dedication requirements
The guidance document Best Practices for Implementing Water Conservation and Demand Management Through Land Use Planning Efforts contains an important note on water dedication requirements:
“While it is incumbent on water providers and land use authorities to ensure that adequate water is available for new development, overly rigid or conservative water dedication requirements can reduce motivation for conservation and force unnecessary dry-up of agricultural land. The amount of water required for dedication (or the amount of the cash-in-lieu fee) should be based on realistic water use data and provide a means for developers to reduce the amount required through the adoption of significant or extraordinary water conservation measures or through the initial configuration of the development.” [Emphasis added]
As one example, developers designed the Sterling Ranch community to use one third of the water Douglas County traditionally requires developers to provide in their water dedication requirements.
Resources
- DOLA Land Use and Water Planner, Scott Williamson (scott.williamson@state.co.us)
- DOLA Water and Land Use Integration for Local Governments webpage
- DOLA Regional Managers
- Colorado Water Conservation Board’s Land Use webpage