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Rio Rancho appeals ruling in water rights case
Published
Modified
RIO RANCHO — The city of Rio Rancho is moving forward in its appellate case challenging a judge’s order denying the city groundwater permits that the Pueblo of Sandia argued would have harmed its existing water rights and the welfare of the state.
The city filed on Oct. 15 a request for oral argument following its notice of appeal a month earlier in response to the ruling of Judge George Eichwald in the 13th Judicial District Court of Sandoval County. The Office of the State Engineer, which approved the applications years earlier, has also appealed the judge’s ruling.
Maria O’Brien, the city’s attorney in the appellate case, wrote in the latest filing that Eichwald “rewrote established (state) water law.” O’Brien then asked the appellate court to consider almost 25 issues in which the district court might have erred in its ruling.
The applications would have allowed Rio Rancho to transfer a portion of its water rights to offset the impact of groundwater pumping on the surface water of the Rio Grande stream system, located close to the pueblo.
But the pueblo, which uses the Rio Grande’s water for cultural, ceremonial and religious purposes, protested the filing of the applications. The challenge went to an administrative law judge before it went to a trial before Eichwald in March.
City spokesperson Jaley Turpen previously wrote in an email that the city has “no comment on the ruling or any action the city might take in the future.”
