LINCOLN - Republican River Compact administrators agreed Wednesday in Lincoln to have a compact compliance arbitrator under contract within 30 days.

However, no company was named or suggested before the annual two-day compact administration meeting adjourned.

Lower Republican Natural Resources District Manager Mike Clements of Alma told the Hub in a telephone interview on his way home from the compact meeting that there were no comments on a possible arbitrator or schedule other than the 30-day agreement.

No future meetings of the three compact member states - Nebraska, Kansas and Colorado - were discussed, Clements said.

The 2002 Kansas v. Nebraska lawsuit-compact settlement agreement listed CDR Associates of Boulder, Colo., as the company hired to work with the administration on initial settlement discussions, and the company was asked by the states in April 2002 to continue working with them.
Clements said CDR wasn't mentioned at Wednesday's meeting.

The settlement agreement requires the states to participate in nonbinding arbitration if they are unable to reach unanimous agreement on any disputes. Representatives of all three states agreed to arbitration at a May compact meeting in Lincoln.

Arbitration issues include a proposed remedy for Nebraska's violation of the Republican River Compact and lawsuit settlement, estimates of beneficial consumptive use of Nebraska's virgin water, division of evaporation losses from Harlan County Lake, non-federal reservoir evaporation below Harlan County Lake, return flows from fields and canals, other return flows, beneficial consumptive use and water supply accounting issues, and approval of a Colorado plan to offset stream depletions by introducing groundwater directly into the stream.

In May, the states' representatives agreed that arbitration should be conducted on a "fast-track" basis. It's been estimated the process could take up to 10 months to complete, after which Kansas could decide to take its compact compliance issues with Nebraska back to the U.S. Supreme Court.