Will Utah County get CUP water?

SALEM — Mayor Randy Brailsford will testify before a congressional subcommittee Wednesday in favor of a Central Utah Project Completion Act amendment that could increase municipal use of CUP water.

Most of the water is currently designated for irrigation use.

Brailsford chairs the 10-member South Utah County mayors group that wants more CUP water for future growth. The mayors group is fighting to prevent all the water from going to Salt Lake County for the next half-century, a concept now under review.

"Water follows money," Brailsford said. Salt Lake County could pay for the water faster than south Utah County, he said, noting that could tip the balance to Salt Lake County's favor.

Spanish Fork City Engineer Richard Heap will accompany Brailsford.

A planned Spanish Fork Canyon pipeline to bring the water into south Utah County under the former Spanish Fork to Nephi project was stopped several years ago. But south Utah County city officials say the 1998 decision to scrap the pipeline was never finalized and is still feasible. Now they want it to carry culinary water for the cities, rather than irrigation water for farms.

Brailsford wants to make clear to the House Resources Subcommittee on Water and Power that the Spanish Fork Canyon pipeline should be built. He said CUP water is needed for growth through the year 2070, when the region's population could swell to 600,000.

About 15,800 average acre feet per year of CUP water is still uncommitted.

"(The proposed shift in water use) is a good deal for the cities," said Ron Johnson, program director of the U.S. Department of Interior.

Farmers, however, will likely testify against it, he said.

A final plan and decision on the use of what is expected to be the final allocation of CUP water is at least two years away, said Don Christianson, director of the Central Utah Water Conservancy District.

"The (Spanish Fork Canyon) pipeline is still being considered," Christianson said. "We're doing everything we can to get them water."

Salt Lake County water officials also need to know how much CUP water they will get before tapping other sources, Christianson said. South Utah County cities have already signed contracts for more CUP water, but it can't be delivered without the Spanish Fork Canyon pipeline, he said.