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Show Corps of Engineers hearing may hold up CUP diversion A major environmental battle over he Central Utah Project -- over Aether adequate water would be left n streams diverted for the project --,ill --,ill be fought in a public hearing in ibout a month. The issue, raised by the Sierra Club, nay kill the Strawberry Aqueduct of he CUP. The hearing will result in a lecision on whether a permit for a CUP lam will be issued. The general manager of the Central Jtah Water Conservancy District said he hearing will delay the project, orcing its price tag higher. He (uestioned whether the corps has the ight to hold such a hearing. The dispute over how much ;lreamflow is needed to preserve fish labitat in the many Utah streams liverted or dammed for the CUP has en raging for many years. It is now ibout to enter the formal arena of a xiblic hearing. Under Section 404 of the federal Clean Vater Act, the Army Corps of engineers has the duty to issue or deny xrmits to put dredged or fill material n stream channels for projects like the TP. Obviously, no dam could be built ifh6ut permission to dump fill in the 4rcam. "to the vast majority of cases, the necessary permits are issued routinely. - Rut in a meeting a week ago, corps officials told the project's builders, the federal Bureau of Reclamation, that the permits would not be issued routinely'for the CUP's Vat Diversion Ham. The dam is a link in the Strawberry Aqueduct System. "A public hearing has been requested, and we're currently in the process of arranging for a public hearing with the Bureau of Reclamation," said Arthur Champ, chief of the1 corp's district regulatory section, Sacramento, Calif. "At this point it appears that the . public hearing will be in late August or e"ly September," he said. After the hewing, the record will be kept open for 10 days," at which time a decision could be made as to whether or not to issue the permit." is the hearing being held in this case1? "In this case we did get a request ( for hearing) from the local chapter of the Mfrra Club" in Utah, he said, The Wps' policy is to grant valid requests w hearings. Whether a request is valid, he added, s to do with whether there are substantial issues or questions that t0 e aired at a public hearing, w whether additional information is or could be obtained." Tl,e main question raised by the TTt . Sierra Club "has to do with downstream down-stream releases for fish," he said. The corps hasn't taken a position on that dispute, he added. Champ said the hearing will not be limited to arguments over the Vat Diversion Dam itself. "The question is what downstream releases should occur in the entire basin, the entire system, not just this one feature," he said.. Main backer of the CUP is the Central Cen-tral Utah Water Conservancy District, with headquarters in Orem. Lynn Ludlow, general manager of the district, questions the right of the corps to hold the hearing. The project "has been authorized by Congress; it has been funded every year," he said. The federal government has put $200 million into it so far, he said. . Referring to the hearing, he said, "We're not sure just what the impact would be. "It would delay the project, and of course, any delay, with increasing construction costs, increases the cost of the project." The increase will have to be passed on the CUP's water users in. Salt Lake and Utah counties, Ludlow added. |