Conservation districts care for watersheds, dams

By Richard Shaw

(Editors note: This is the fifth and final article in a series about the entities that manage water in the Price River drainage.)
The Great Depression of the 1930s brought a lot of changes to the land people call the United States. And during that unfortunate time in the country’s history, things went from bad to worse on many fronts, affecting the economy even more.
One of those events was the Great Dust Bowl. During that time poor farming practices, in conjunction with drought and some large wind storms, led to inches of top soil being blown off of land in the midwest and toward the east. When these clouds of dirt crossed the east coast,where the majority of the residents of the country lived and where the political power lay, Congress decided something must be done about soil and water conservation in the west.
In 1935 Congress authorized the Soil Conservation Act, and it was set to be controlled under the Department of Agriculture which created a department called the Soil Conservation Service. That agency is called the NRCS (Natural Resource Conservation Service) today. It was at that point, in the 1930s, that conservation districts began to be organized.
One of the things that was recognized early on was that private land owners would need to be involved in all projects to make the act work properly.
In 1937 the Utah State Legislature also set up its own laws for soil conservation, which allowed for the creation of local conservation efforts. In February of 1938 the Price River Watershed Conservation District was formed. Since that time a board of five directors has managed the development of the Price River Watershed Plan. Each year they help the NRCS in implementing salinity projects, work on noxious weed control, work with sage grouse issues and help bring education to the youth of the area on conservation issues.
Not long after that another agency to manage water was created. The Carbon Water Conservancy District (CWCD) came into being. This agency largely manages the Scofield Reservoir dam and also looks after the watershed above the reservoir. The management of the dam is in conjunction with the Bureau of Reclamation (BOR). In recent years a construction project to renovate some of the dams infrastructure has been a top priority of both agencies.
The CWCD helps water users obtain funding for projects, while itself is responsible for projects that affect the county as a whole.
The charge of protecting the county’s water resources has led to a battle that has ranged for over 80 years between Carbon County and Sanpete County on plans the later has to build the so-called Gooseberry Project. The off again, on again project has been a major news story over the years.
The story of the fight over the water resources of the Wasatch Plateau has been epic, a conflict which mirrors many in the west, where water is often more precious than land. Dams that have been built in the drainage, particularly in the early days, failed or became unusable. In the 1930’s a plan was put in place to build a new dam in the Pleasant Valley area (Scofield) and to later build a dam on the Gooseberry Narrows in Sanpete County. However World War II changed things.
Previous floods and poor dam construction that led to the destruction of roads and particularly rail lines in Price Canyon, set up building the Scofield Dam first. At the time the canyon was being used to haul coal and coal products to Utah County where the Geneva Steel plant had been constructed to make thick and strong armor for warships. A flood could disrupt that transportation system so emphasis was placed on building Scofield Dam. It’s construction began in 1942. However it was not finished until after the war was over. Sanpete put off their plans to build a dam until after the war.
Since that time, 70 years ago, legal battles have come and gone concerning the construction of the Gooseberry Project. At times the idea seemed to be dropped and at other times it was on the hot burner of the stove again.
At the edge of this fight is the CWCD. In recent years the BOR has seemed to side with Sanpete. However, in the last go around the BOR said in a report that the Gooseberry Project was a viable one, yet offered no help in funding the construction of the project which, depending on whom is giving the estimate, could range from $50 million to over $100 million to build.
Sanpete continues to push for funding, while the CWCD fights to keep water that the county feels belongs on the eastern side of the mountains flowing into Scofield Reservoir. The main crux of the fight, in simple terms, has been whether the water right that Sanpete County has is being fulfilled each year. Carbon claims that Sanpete gets their right from the Fairview Lakes and water tunnels that divert water to the area. Sanpete says it needs storage to get their proper water rights.
The argument about how much water is actually going out of the natural Price River drainage to the western valleys continues to rage today.