Place and proposal
A living valley. A line we will not cross.
A living valley, already sharing its water.
Homestake Valley near Red Cliff holds a creek, groundwater-fed fens, wet meadows, ponds and forest edges. Fens are wetlands where groundwater keeps soil wet enough for peat to build over centuries. Water connects parts of this landscape through the seasons, sustaining wildlife and the places families return to.
Existing collectors and Homestake Reservoir already send water through a tunnel across the Continental Divide to Aurora and Colorado Springs. Whitney would add a reservoir lower in the valley, collect tributary water and pump it uphill into that system. Four potential dam sites are described in the reviewed record; no final design was selected in that record.
County review updated November 2, 2026. Source and observation dates accompany the evidence.
The whole physical project
The footprint is larger than the lake.
Whitney would store collected creek water and pump it uphill to the existing Homestake system. Flooding would replace valley-floor habitat; collection would change where and when water remains; roads, power and equipment would disturb other parts of the same landscape during construction and operation.
Whitney's proposed water system
- CollectTributary water
- StoreProposed Whitney Reservoir
- MovePump uphill
- ConnectExisting Homestake system
Land affected beyond the shoreline
- Power and machinery
- Lines, clearing, equipment, operating noise and a permanent industrial presence
- Roads and access
- Relocation, traffic, closures, habitat fragmentation and lost public recreation
- Groundwater and drainage
- Trenches and altered drainage that can affect fen-supporting water beyond the shoreline
Shared wetland exposure
Every modeled Whitney option puts the same 81.4 mapped acres underwater at full pool.
Whitney threatens Homestake’s fens and connected wetlands. These are mapped wetlands and Potential Fen habitat. Potential fens are mapped areas awaiting confirmation of their fen classification. All four modeled full-pool options cover the same 81.4 acres. Each also covers additional ground, giving individual totals of 85.4 to 134.8 acres, including that shared core. The wider Whitney-to-Eagle assessment maps 362.1 acres in 36 wetland complexes connected to Homestake Creek, extending to the Eagle River confluence near Red Cliff. Overlapping inventory polygons are counted once and mapped-water categories are excluded.
The maps use the same extent, scale, orientation and legend, so the flood zones can be compared directly.
The 85.4–134.8-acre alternative totals measure modeled flooding at full pool. The 362.1-acre Whitney-to-Eagle inventory describes the wider connected wetland system exposed to changes in streamflow and groundwater. Orange arrows mark the approximate downstream work vicinity.
Inspect the shared-overlap evidence · Read the map and acreage method
Habitat processes
Water sustains habitat through the seasons.
Spring runoff connects channels and wet ground. As summer water falls, persistent ponds, groundwater and flowing creek reaches become refuges. Beavers are a keystone species: their dams can hold and spread water, sustaining habitat used by many other kinds of life. Groundwater-fed fens and beaver ponds have different origins and water supplies, even where they share connections.
Colorado studies show side-channel connections changing through summer and seasonal main-channel dam building during low water. Ordinary low flow can create dam sites; severe or prolonged drying can remove usable depth, passage and forage. Read the seasonal habitat evidence.
Permanent flooding would replace peat-forming vegetation and groundwater-fed habitat with a reservoir. At one of four restored Colorado fens, disturbed surface peat still differed from reference peat 20 years after restoration. The loss includes peat structure, water regime and ecological relationships built over time.
Four wildlife-camera stations on the valley floor have recorded use across seasons. Each station is in habitat that at least one documented Whitney option would flood, although the option varies by site. Flooding would remove habitat while roads, lighting, traffic and noise would fragment the surrounding network.
Water carries the connection downstream
Homestake Creek flows to the Eagle and Colorado rivers. Healthy water and usable access connect fishing, family days and wildlife encounters with livelihoods in Red Cliff, Minturn and downstream communities. The Local Economy brief follows those relationships.
Go deeper: see how peat and groundwater sustain the fen · Inspect the valley's wildlife record
Existing water export and supply limits
Water in the West is a rapidly changing landscape.
Homestake Creek flows to the Eagle River, then the Colorado. Water exported from this valley leaves that shared river system. A reservoir’s capacity is the amount it holds at one time; dependable annual supply is the water it can reliably deliver year after year, including dry periods.
- About 23,400 acre-feet per year
- Homestake Tunnel export, WY2007–2024
- About 21,500 acre-feet per year
- Flow past Gold Park, WY2007–2024
Whitney would add storage and collection works to this existing diversion system. The Whitney concepts describe 6,850–20,000 acre-feet of storage. Whitney has been discussed as part of Eagle River Joint Use, a cooperative water-development framework for East and West Slope participants. That broader project has an objective of up to 20,000 acre-feet per year for East Slope supply. Whitney’s storage capacity and the annual water it could reliably deliver are different measures.
On average, 8.7% more water was exported through Homestake Tunnel than flowed past Gold Park in water years 2007–2024.
What governs the water available to fill it?
Warming reduces Colorado River supply and changes snowmelt and refill opportunities. Three distinct systems shape how that water can be used:
- Shoshone’s senior water rights
- The Glenwood Canyon power plant returns water after generation. Its earlier rights have priority over affected junior rights, including upstream diversions. When supply is short, a water call asks state officials to enforce that priority and can limit when upstream reservoirs fill.
- Colorado River Compact
- Homestake lies in the Upper Basin, the upstream part of the Colorado River system. The interstate agreement divides river use between the Upper and Lower Basins. Colorado, New Mexico, Utah and Wyoming must not cause flow past Lee Ferry, Arizona, to fall below the agreed volume over ten consecutive years. Lee Ferry is the accounting point for that obligation.
- Lake Powell and Lake Mead operations
- These major Colorado River reservoirs hold water for later use. Federal operating rules govern storage and releases, shaping how water moves through the wider supply system during shortage.
Together, shrinking inflows and these distinct legal and operating limits shape how much water a long-lived Whitney project could reliably collect, refill and deliver.
Climate, Shoshone and Compact evidence · Shoshone’s agreement and water calls
The cities have choices
Aurora reports water use down 36% since the early 2000s alongside reuse and landscape reform. Colorado Springs Utilities reports a 40% decline in per-person use since 2001. These different measures show that demand can change. Further conservation and reuse reduce future supply needs; savings already included in forecasts remain part of their baseline.
County decision
County approval depends on every applicable standard.
On October 27, 2026, Eagle County’s commissioners approved revised 1041 rules for water projects and other activities. The Board voted to make them effective upon passage of a separate enacting resolution. As of November 2, 2026, passage of that resolution could not be verified. A Whitney permit would require its own decision.
The applicant bears the burden of proof. The Board must deny a permit if the applicant cannot meet every applicable standard, even with conditions. The approved rules name fens as waterbodies in §109. Section 307 covers groundwater and wetland hydrology, and §406 protects streamflow, groundwater and wetland functions. All four modeled pools would inundate valley-floor wetlands and mapped potential fen habitat.
Chapter VI separately tests whether a project is necessary and whether its benefits to Eagle County outweigh local resource losses. The approved Article 4 omits those two tests and the July draft’s least-adverse-alternative test. Section 331 still calls for projected demand and conservation measures, and §434(D) requires efficient water use, including recycling and reuse.
1994
A court reinstated Eagle County's denial of the specific Homestake II proposal on wetland and nuisance evidence. The cities' water rights did not guarantee approval of that design.
Landscape and history
Protect the whole cultural landscape.
The Southern Ute Indian Tribe describes seasonal journeys to nearby Pando Valley, now Camp Hale, to hunt and gather, and an Eagle River route to the hot springs at Glenwood Springs. Camp Hale later trained the 10th Mountain Division for mountain warfare. These living relationships and shared memories give the wider landscape meaning beyond its water supply. Ute seasonal journeys and enduring connections · Camp Hale’s mountain-training legacy
- Holy Cross Wilderness and public lands. A boundary change would permanently remove congressionally protected acreage to serve a new interbasin diversion. Roads, infrastructure and noise would erode the solitude and primitive recreation the designation protects.
- Ute and 10th Mountain history. Preserving connected places keeps cultural practices, historical evidence and memories tied to the landscape where they belong. Flooding, blasting and road relocation threaten those relationships wherever the project disturbs them.
- A living river's share. Water in Homestake Creek sustains downstream wetlands, aquatic habitat and a living river through dry years.
Requested outcome
Keep Homestake Valley intact.
Front Range growth does not create a claim on Western Slope water. The durable path is conservation, reuse, system efficiency and enforceable demand limits, not another interbasin diversion.
- Deny Whitney and its connected works if the complete project cannot satisfy every applicable County standard.
- Reject new or expanded interbasin diversions from Homestake Valley.
- Protect the resources that cannot be replaced: ancient peat, connected habitat, a living creek, public access, quiet and cultural landscape.
- Meet future demand through conservation, reuse and efficiency before sacrificing another Western Slope headwater valley.
Homestake II shows what documented impacts, local standards and sustained public participation can achieve. Watch Eagle County’s meeting notices for any future Whitney permit hearing. We owe our children and future generations an intact Homestake Valley.