Upper Colorado and San Juan River Basins Endangered Fish Recovery Programs Reauthorization Act of 2024

Mr. Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and pass the bill (H.R. 4596) to reauthorize the Bureau of Reclamation to provide cost-shared funding to implement the endangered and threatened fish recovery programs for the Upper Colorado and San Juan River Basins, as amended.

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days in which to revise and extend their remarks and include extraneous material on H.R. 4596, the bill now under consideration.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of Representative Boebert's bill, the Upper Colorado and San Juan River Basins Endangered Fish Recovery Programs Reauthorization Act of 2024.

The Upper Colorado and San Juan River Basins endangered fish recovery programs provide Endangered Species Act compliance for over 2,500 water and hydroelectric power projects.

Without these recovery programs, projects would be open to litigation and disruptions to operations that would negatively impact millions of Americans' water and power supplies.

These programs have been a conservation success story. Their goal is to recover four ESA-listed fish species: the Colorado pikeminnow, the razorback sucker, the humpback chub, and the bonytail. Yet, they also allow for the continuation of operations to meet current and future needs.

In recent years, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has recognized the program's success by reclassifying the humpback chump from an endangered species to a threatened species.

This service has also proposed to reclassify the razorback sucker from an endangered species to a threatened species.

In a report submitted to Congress in March of 2023, the service stated: ``When the recovery programs were initiated in 1988 and 1992, the trajectory of all four listed species was toward extinction. The implementation of these recovery elements not only prevented extinctions, but substantially improved the prospect for recovering the listed fishes.'' This is a rare occurrence and should be celebrated.

I urge my colleagues to allow this success to continue by supporting this legislation, and I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 5 minutes to the gentlewoman from Colorado (Ms. Boebert), the lead sponsor of this bill.

Mr. Speaker, I have no further requests for time, I am prepared to close, and I continue to reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, the Upper Colorado and San Juan River Endangered Fish Recovery Programs are essential to the region's future. These programs have been successful in conserving and recovering endangered species, which is the goal of the Endangered Species Act.

Mr. Speaker, as an Arkansas Razorback, I rise in strong support of this legislation that will continue to help recover the razorback sucker.

Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for his support, and I appreciate the bipartisan support here in the House.

I rise in support of H.R. 4596, the Upper Colorado and San Juan River Basins Endangered Fish Recovery Programs Reauthorization Act of 2024. This bicameral bill, which passed through the House Natural Resources Committee with unanimous bipartisan support, provides a clean, 7-year reauthorization of the Upper Colorado and San Juan Recovery Programs that protect four threatened and endangered native fish species in the Upper Colorado and San Juan River Basins by extending conservation programs at current funding levels for 7 additional fiscal years.

These programs provide Endangered Species Act compliance to ensure 2,500 water projects continue to function and provide legal certainty for water users throughout Colorado, New Mexico, Utah, and Wyoming.

These projects, including 1,200 in Colorado alone, include major water reservoirs, agricultural water users, ski areas, and power- generation facilities that use more than 3.7 million acre-feet of water per year.

The Upper Colorado and San Juan Recovery Programs were established in 1988 to achieve full recovery for four federally listed endangered fish species, including the humpback chub, bonytail, Colorado pikeminnow, and razorback sucker.

Those designations led to the threat of significant water- and power- use restrictions. For over three decades, States, Tribes, local communities, environmental groups, energy users, and water users have partnered to help recover four threatened and endangered fish species while continuing water and power facility development and operations in the Upper Colorado River Basin and the San Juan River Basin.

Without these programs, these 2,500 water and power users would have to perform extremely burdensome Section 7 consultations for all 2,500 individual projects. Because of the success of these programs, the humpback chub and the razorback sucker are success stories and have been downlisted from endangered to threatened under the Endangered Species Act.

Last Congress, I worked on a short-term extension to reauthorize these programs until September 30 of 2024. I

am proud to report that this bill today is the result of months of hard work with local stakeholders, the Bureau of Reclamation, and Senators Hickenlooper and Romney to provide a long-term solution by reauthorizing these vital programs until 2031.

My bill has significant support from more than 30 Colorado and Western stakeholder organizations, including Denver Water, Pueblo Water, both of the Colorado Indian Tribes, Utah Water Users Association, and many more.

I urge the passage of this critical bipartisan and bicameral legislation.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of H.R. 4596, the Upper Colorado and San Juan River Basins Endangered Fish Recovery Programs Reauthorization Act.

This bill would reauthorize two fish recovery programs in the Colorado River Basin: the Upper Colorado River Endangered Fish Recovery Program, and the San Juan River Basin Implementation Program.

The Colorado River is known as the hardest working river in the West, supporting a multitude of uses, including irrigation, municipal water use, recreation, and sustaining numerous fish and wildlife species.

Established in the late eighties and early nineties, these two fish recovery programs allowed the Bureau of Reclamation to partner with other Federal agencies, States, Tribes, and hydropower customers, water users, and conservation groups to work collaboratively on species recovery and ensure water-related projects are in compliance with the Endangered Species Act.

Without this reauthorization, these two programs will expire, and we risk the long history of collaboration and successful recovery of four native fish species. We need to get this done as soon as possible.

Mr. Speaker, I support the bill, and I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to support the legislation, and I yield back the balance of my time.