Blog: A century ago in Colorado River Compact negotiations: Storage, yes. But in the compact?
When the Colorado River Compact Commission’s members returned to negotiations on the morning of Nov. 14 , 1922, they were presented with three important questions – one which survived as language in the final compact and two which did not, but all three of which remain important to the river’s management today. As they convened that morning at Bishop’s Lodge, outside Santa Fe, Commission Chairman Herbert Hoover laid out what he called “our three main propositions” – a division of the use of the water between an upper and lower basin the term of a multi-year upstream-to-downstrom flow commitment (flow at Lee’s Ferry)and a minimum delivery for any one year the question of whether the compact should be made contingent on construction of large storage reservoirs on the river.