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August 17, 2007 - 1:33AM
PALMER LAKE - Water will soon flow into Palmer Lake from a pipeline to Monument Creek.

The Palmer Lake Town Council voted 6-1 Thursday night to open a valve that will send water from reservoirs above the town into the evaporating lake. Mayor Max Parker cast the lone dissenting vote.

The move comes at the recommendation of the town’s volunteer Awake the Lake Committee, which says the town hasn’t been taking advantage of all its water rights.

“Right now all that water is going to somebody else. It’s our water,” said committee spokesman Jeff Hulsmann.


“Right now all that water is going to somebody else. It’s our water,” said committee spokesman Jeff Hulsmann.

But Ronnie Sperling, the town’s water attorney, said Palmer Lake can’t legally store creek water in the lake without applying for storage rights from the state. The valve-opening plan could leave the town facing a lawsuit, she said.

The valve will be opened once the town installs a meter to track water usage, Parker said.

Officials didn’t give a timeline on how long that would take.

The council approved two plans of attack recommended by Awake the Lake: first, exchanging treated wastewater for creek water, and second, using excess creek water it has rights to but the town’s water filtering plant can’t handle.

Town drinking water comes from two reservoirs above the town and is transported down the mountainside via Monument Creek. Then it’s treated and distributed to homes.

Awake the Lake says the town’s aging plant can only process 10 percent of the water it receives, with the rest going downstream to other entities such as Monument and Colorado Springs. The plan approved Thursday night will divert the excess water to the lake.

Colorado’s complex water laws make the situation more difficult, however, because other downstream users with water rights senior to those of Palmer Lake can claim the water first.

That means the creek water might not always be available during times of drought, officials said. But filling the lake will never supersede the town’s need for drinking water, they said.

“We’re not going to put water in the lake when we need to put water in the faucets,” said Awake the Lake member Larry Myers.

The Town Council also voted to pursue legal storage rights for the lake — a move they started, then suspended, earlier this year.

State Water Commissioner Rich Snyder, who attended Thursday’s meeting, said the valve-opening solution is OK as an interim measure while the town obtains storage rights.

Thanks to a wet summer, the lake is in good shape now — about 4½ feet deep, 1½ feet below an optimum depth of 6 feet.

nepco