ID SCR137

Direct the Idaho Water Resource Board, with technical support from the Idaho Department of Water Resources, to work expeditiously with local water users to develop a comprehensive settlement resolving competing water supply demands in the Lemhi River Basin.

The comprehensive settlement must be consistent with past practices, future needs, and Idaho law, and should protect private property rights while preserving the farming and ranching lifestyle and economy of the Lemhi River Basin.

Acknowledge that Lemhi irrigators have historically diverted natural flow in excess of decreed rights during spring runoff, a practice memorialized in the 1982 Lemhi Basin Decree and reaffirmed through Basin 74 General Provision in the Snake River Basin Adjudication Final Unified Decree.

Address legal uncertainties created by the non-decreeing of irrigators' high-flow claims, recent tributary water right applications, and U.S. Forest Service federal reserved water rights on the Salmon River.

Require the Idaho Water Resource Board to report to the First Regular Session of the Sixty-sixth Idaho Legislature on implementation of this resolution.