In West, recreation parks lay claim to scarce water

As the current gushes down Clear Creek, waves buck beneath Preston Levato like the thrashing of a wild bull, and he strains to keep his kayak upright.

The adrenaline-charged sport of "playboating" - kayaking on roiling water as it spills over rocks - is captivating a streamside crowd at Golden's Clear Creek Whitewater Park, and turning the heads of passing dog walkers, bicyclists, and mothers pushing strollers. It's a Saturday afternoon, and a dozen kayakers in Crayola-colored boats are practicing intently. But the crowd's rapt attention - and the kayakers' glee - belies the bitter controversy here in Colorado over a sport that's pitted Old West Values against a New West hunger for the economic windfall of tourism.

At issue are manmade kayak courses like this one: They draw crowds, pumping cash into limp local economies. But the parks depend on vast allocations of water - one of the arid West's most prized and contested commodities.

The debate turns on the question of whether recreation should be on par with "traditional" water uses in agriculture, homes, and industry. Critics say that even though whitewater courses don't actually use the water they claim, the rushing-river effect means there's less water available for others.

"By locking water in the stream for this use, we don't know what the total impacts are upstream and downstream for future development," says Ray Christensen, executive vice president of the Colorado Farm Bureau. "From a public-policy standpoint, we don't think this is an important use." With a resource as limited as Western water, he says, each demand raises pressure on consumers.

The agricultural community is not alone in its concerns. The state, too, is troubled by the potential impact of playboating, and has challenged the legality of three whitewater parks - including Golden's. But a recent ruling by the Colorado supreme court found those water rights satisfy the letter of the law.

The legal issues are complex: Colorado has long precluded municipalities from claiming water solely for aesthetic or recreational use. And state law requires a diversion to "perfect" a water right - and earn the water court's approval. But Golden was the first Colorado town to circumvent that legal obstacle, claiming water rights and yet retaining them in the stream. By placing rocks and dam-like structures in a stretch of Clear Creek, they created the legal fiction of a water diversion. Although the water was channeled - and not taken from the stream - it satisfied the legal standard.

"The law allows you to either divert or control the water within the channel," explains Steve Bushong, a Boulder water attorney who defended Golden, Vail, and Breckenridge. The court's decision "puts recreation on equal footing with other uses of water," he says.

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