Standley Lake

Standley Lake is a 1,000-acre (4.0 km²) lake located in Westminster, Colorado. The lake serves as a reservoir and is also used for recreation. It is the prominent feature of the surrounding 3,000-acre (12 km²) Standley Lake Regional Park.

The reservoir covers approximately 1,000 acres (4.0 km²), with 42,000 acre feet (52,000,000 m³) of capacity with its deepest point at 96 feet. The reservoir's water comes from Clear Creek and Woman's Creek. Standley Lake Reservoir is used as a municipal water supply for Westminster, Northglenn, and Thornton, as well as agricultural irrigation.^[1]

A local high school, Standley Lake High School, is named after the lake, as is a nearby Jefferson County library as well as several local businesses, shopping centers and residential subdivisions. The lake is owned by the Farmers Reservoir and Irrigation Company (FRICO); the surrounding park and the recreational use of the lake are managed by the City of Westminster.

History

Standley Lake is named after O.J. Standley, a vice-president of Chicago Title and Trust. He was involved in financing immigrants to come to the United States and become farmers. He had a grand plan to build a 100,000 acre feet (120,000,000 m³) lake that would be able to irrigate the many farms that were starting up in the area. His original plan was in the Barr Lake area. He was not able to fulfill his original plan. He met Thomas P. Croke who was recruiting Irish immigrants to work for the railroad. Mr. Croke held an interest in the Kinnear Reservoir which dates back to 1869 and the original plan of 100,000 acre feet (120,000,000 m³) lake was again alive by enlarging the Kinnear Reservoir and it would have the largest earth-filled dam.

The project began in 1902 with Joseph Standley, Thomas P. Croke and Milton Smith incorporating the Farmers Reservoir and Irrigation Company. The original plan to be revised down from 100,000 acre feet (120,000,000 m³) to 50,000 acre feet (62,000,000 m³) and the intention at the time was to raise the dam later to its full capacity. Construction began in 1907 and although problems concerning the stability of the dam were noted during construction the work went on and was completed in May 1912. In 1913 cracks began to appear in the dam, and a major slide occurred on the downstream face in 1914. This was repaired immediately. In 1916 there was another major slide, this time on the upstream face of the dam. This was not repaired until 1922. It was not until an agreement with the Farmers Reservoir and Irrigation Company (FRICO) in 1963 gave Westminster 12,000 acre feet (15,000,000 m³) of storage in Standley Lake. This was Westminster's first major water agreement.

This agreement was the beginning of several years of competition, distrust and lawsuits as Westminster competed with FRICO for Clear Creek Water .The February 16, 1972 issue of the Rocky Mountain News" A demand for utilities by tax-rich industry in northwest Jefferson and West Adams counties in 1970 kicked off the biggest and bitterest land war in recent Denver metropolitan history." The original dispute began with Westminster, Northglenn, and Broomfield over revenues from building industrial complexes that were in un-incorporated areas near Westminster. Westminster was the only one with enough water to serve new companies. There were two things that fueled this bitter dispute; each city's heavy investment in or desire for utilities and the Colorado annexation law. Commerce City and Arvada entered the dispute later. By 1971 Westminster had quelled most of the land battles. In 1978 FRICO and the City of Westminster sat down and settled the "Flip Flop Suit," giving Westminster the right to carry over unused water, thus increasing the City's water supply at no additional cost. ^[2]

In 1988 the Standley Lake Task Force was formed by the City of Westminster and Jefferson County. In April 1998, Jefferson County Open Space (JCOS) and FRICO finalized several years of negotiations and reached an agreement for the purchase of the land and recreation rights surrounding Standley Lake. JCOS then deeded all property owned at that time to the City of Westminster for the purpose of upgrading and maintaining Standley Lake as a regional park. JCOS also contributed $2.4 Million to be used for improvements which included a boat ramp, campground, restroom facilities, fish cleaning station, ranger station/visitor center, access roads and trail system. The area was designated a Regional Park in 1998.^[3]

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