10th Circuit upholds dismissal of complaint seeking to enforce inter-state compact in Three Forks Ranch case
Issued April 23, 2004

In Three Forks Ranch Corp. v. City of Cheyenne, et al., the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the district court’s dismissal of Three Forks Ranch’s (“the Ranch”) complaint on the grounds that the Upper Colorado River Basin Compact (“the Compact”) does not provide a private right of action for the Ranch to enforce its Colorado water rights against the City of Cheyenne and its Board of Public Utilities, the Wyoming State Engineer, and the Wyoming Water Development Commission (“Wyoming Defendants”).

The Ranch is a Wyoming corporation that owns Colorado water rights and land in Routt County, Colorado. At the time the Ranch filed its complaint, the City had completed two stages of a water supply project authorized by the Wyoming legislature, which involves trans-basin diversions designed to increase storage and availability of water to various Wyoming water users.

The Ranch claims to be the first Colorado property downstream from the City’s exchange project diversions on the North Fork of the Little Snake River and its Wyoming tributaries. The Ranch brought suit invoking federal question jurisdiction under Article XI of the Compact. The Ranch claimed, among other things, that the exchange project violated the Compact and that any further development of the City’s water supply project would cause injury to the Ranch’s water rights and land. The Ranch sought injunctive relief to either limit the City’s diversions, prevent further City diversions, or to have the Wyoming Defendants construct compensatory storage for the Ranch’s benefit. The federal District Court for the District of Colorado initially dismissed the complaint on various grounds including state sovereign immunity, lack of personal jurisdiction over the City, lack of a private right of action under the Compact, and failure to join the Compact States as necessary and indispensable parties.