Perkins County Canal Fight Heads to Supreme Court

Colorado Politics’ Marianne Goodland reports that the U.S. Supreme Court has agreed to hear Nebraska’s lawsuit against Colorado over the proposed Perkins County Canal, a water fight rooted in the 1923 South Platte River Compact and now headed into the rare air of original jurisdiction. That sounds tidy and legalistic until you get to the part where Nebraska’s canal would run through land owned by six Colorado landowners in Sedgwick County who have refused to sell.

That is where this stops being a neat little interstate paperwork dispute and becomes a very Colorado fight about water, land, and power. Nebraska has compact claims. Colorado has legal obligations. Fine. But nobody should be allowed to skip cheerfully past the words “eminent domain” like they are a footnote in a grant application.

The Bullet Point Brief

• The Supreme Court agreed to let Nebraska bring its claims against Colorado over the Perkins County Canal. Translation: the grown-ups in robes are now being asked to sort out a water fight that has been simmering for a century and now lands directly on Colorado property owners.
• The proposed canal would cross land owned by six Sedgwick County landowners before entering Nebraska, and those landowners have refused to sell. Funny how “regional water solution” sounds so much nicer than “your land is in the way.”
• Colorado Attorney General Phil Weiser said it would be unprecedented for one state to use eminent domain to seize land in another state. That is not exactly a minor procedural hiccup. That is a constitutional hand grenade with survey flags on it.
• Nebraska argues Colorado is violating the compact and claims Colorado’s water administration has allowed unauthorized South Platte uses, including uses junior to Nebraska’s 1897 irrigation rights. Water law is serious business. So is not treating northeast Colorado like a utility closet.
• The landowners’ attorney warned the diversion could dry up 30,000 to 60,000 acres relying on groundwater for all or part of irrigation, with property damage estimates up to $270,000 in Sedgwick, Logan, and Washington counties, not counting potential impacts on more than 40 municipal wells. But sure, let’s all pretend this is just lines on a bureaucrat’s map.

My Bottom Line

Water is not an abstraction out here. It is farms. Families. Tax bills. Wells. Crops. Court fights. It is whether a piece of ground stays productive or becomes another sacrifice to somebody else’s PowerPoint.

Nebraska may have rights under the compact. Colorado has duties under the compact. The rule of law matters, especially when the subject is water in the West. But property rights matter too, and the second government starts treating private land like a blank square on a board game, every landowner in Colorado ought to sit up straight.

The danger here is not just the canal. It is the smooth little government phrasebook that always shows up when ordinary people are about to get flattened. “Necessary.” “Historic.” “Inevitable.” “Regional.” “For the greater good.” Those words may sound polished in a hearing room, but they hit different when the map runs across your ground and the letter says sell or else.

So yes, let the Supreme Court sort out the compact. Let Colorado defend its entitlements. Let Nebraska make its case. But nobody should be allowed to wash the local impact out of the story. When states fight over water, ordinary landowners usually end up standing in the blast zone while politicians call it leadership.

Source: Colorado Politics