Serving the High Plains
Serving the High Plains
The state wants to partner with Ducks Unlimited to refill Tucumcari Lake with water and revitalize it as a refuge for ducks and other wildlife. However, a couple of officials with the Arch Hurley Conservation District voiced skepticism about the idea.
The Arch Hurley board of directors during its Oct. 8 meeting discussed a letter from Alan Hamilton of the Rio Grande Return conservation group that proposes putting Arch Hurley’s reclamation irrigation water into Tucumcari Lake. Ducks Unlimited, a nonprofit organization dedicated to the preservation of wetlands for waterfowl and other wildlife, wants to partner with New Mexico Game Commission to re-establish Tucumcari Lake as a wildlife refuge with walkways and bathrooms.
Tucumcari Lake, located on an undeveloped area on the east side of town, is listed as 430 acres. Much of the lake, however, remains dry after years of drought. It exists in a natural low spot and has been listed on maps for at least a century.
Hamilton’s letter states the New Mexico Department of Game and Fish has released the conservancy district from any liability for flooding or increase in water level above an elevation of 4,009 feet.
The letter also states Game and Fish agrees to give the district “access to the property for purposes of maintaining, repairing and operating all pumps” to maintain the lake’s water level.
District manager Franklin McCasland and board president Robert Lopez said those sections of the letter are contradictory.
“If it floods again, people will sue Arch Hurley again,” Lopez said, referring to a lawsuit and subsequent decree in 1986 that required Arch Hurley to keep Tucumcari Lake’s levels below 4,009 feet.
McCasland also said he couldn’t envision putting extra water into the lake as a higher priority over the region’s farmers that use the water for crop irrigation.
He also said the pumps at Tucumcari Lake “probably have rotted out” from disuse since the 1990s. The city also uses the lake to drain portions of the city after rainfall.
Hamilton said he wanted to meet with officials from the city, Arch Hurley and Game and Fish about the proposal. McCasland said no date has been set.
An email to Hamilton last week was not returned.
It’s not the first time the Game and Fish Department has eyed Tucumcari Lake as a wildlife resource. In 2014, a wildlife officer with the agency talked to the Tucumcari City Commission about redeveloping the lake, citing it as an underused resource. McCasland said at the time refilling the lake likely would result in high costs for the Arch Hurley district because it would be required to pump away excess water.
In other Arch Hurley business, the board voted to no allocate any more irrigation water at this time. McCasland reported water sales had dropped below 30 cubic feet per second after recent rains but anticipated an uptick in demand with dry weather.