2014 Update:  Understanding the Reserved Water Right Claims filed in the Coeur d’Alene-Spokane River Basin Adjudication

If you filed a water right claim on your property in Cougar Gulch, chances are you received information from the Department of Water Resources Adjudication Bureau in Boise, Idaho last April. The information was titled “Notice of Filing Federal Reserved Water Right Claims in the CDA-Spokane River Basin Adjudication”. It indicated that reserved water right claims had been filed by Avista, the US Forest Service, Bureau of Land Management and the Bureau of Indian Affairs. The purpose of the mailing was to give water right owners a chance to review the federal reserve claims for any possible impact to their personal water right claims. While the mailing may have caused some initial confusion, according to Bob Haynes, long time Cougar Gulch resident and long term employee of the Department of Water Resources (retired), water use in Cougar Gulch is, for the most part, not impacted by these claims. The mailing included a list of federal reserved claim numbers that cover domestic, commercial, municipal and industrial claims; in- stream flows for fish habitat claims; irrigated agriculture claims; springs/seeps claims, and wetland claims. Of the 447 overall claims, 70 fall within Basin 95 where Cougar Gulch is also located. If you are interested in reviewing any of these individual claims listed on the mailing, you can do so by searching Water Right Records and Adjudication Claim Records as follows:
1. Go to IDWR Home page at: www.idwr.idaho.gov.
2. Click on the icon on the right side of the home page titled “Search Water Rights”.
3. Read the water right research terms and conditions and click on the “I Agree to the Terms of Use”.
4. On the next page select item “Adjudication, Water Right & Basin or Transfer” and click the option that states “Search for a
specific basin, right or transfer number”.
5. Click in the box next to Claim/Water Right/Basin. This opens the fields below.
6. Type in basin number (95).
7. Type in sequence number you wish to review (refer to your list of federal reserved claim numbers included with your April
mailing for these numbers).
8. Click the SAVE SEARCH PARAMETER icon.
9. Click the START SEARCH icon.
10. At the bottom of the search screen your results for that sequence number will be listed:
11. Click the “Details” link for “Claim”. Here you can read the details of that particular owner, the source of the right, the uses of that right, as well as any conditions. If you have any questions, please contact the Department of Water Resources.