RESTORE LLR 2

 ALERT and update!!!!

Find out about threat to a dozen of Logan's Island parks from LOGAN RIVER WATERSHED PROJECT (LRWP).

For example:  Why will EVERYONE in the 3 cities be required to pay a monthly fee without getting irrigation water?

Bring signs and questions.
CLICK HERE :::::::::}More info about drought and costs

How will BOTH Logan rivers be conserved?

Why is South Branch provided at least 25 cfs whereas the North Branch in our greenbelt and parks gets dialed down to less than 5 cfs?

Why does this project cost 309 million to install plus 2 million a year to maintain.  That is >11 times that two canals in the Highline rebuild.

Logan's Island hosts many of Logan's greenbelt premier parks and public spaces. 

The Little Logan River along the north edge of the Island has been managed as if it were a canal-causing tremendous harm. 

LRWP continues that mis-management, continues winter-time diversion of the river's flows into the river on the south edge of Logan's Island.

Key aspects of LRWP will trade the river water flowing through our amazing city greenbelt through public spaces
1) to lure in new residential users-- who will water their lawns with river water.
2) securing the water right
3) to secure an under-utilized water right that could be leased to the Great Salt Lake instead.
4) Leasing could generate 50-100 million dollars over the years, and be a source of funding for upgrades.
5) Lawn-watering is the dominant urban use of irrigation water in Utah.

Please bring friends to this public meeting. 

We hope to learn what local water power-brokers plan as they prepare to install a MASSIVE irrigation project in three Cache Valley cities. LEARN and ask about how this plan harms our river and parks. 

QUESTIONS TO CONSIDER: 

• Do the benefits to a small number of farmers west of the cities and urban water users justify the enormous cost? 

 

• How will the nearly 2 million dollars of annual costs be paid? ANY INCREASE IN LOCAL OR STATE OR FEDERAL TAX IS A TAX ON US.

 

• Do sponsors consider the Extreme Drought that has been gripping most of Utah since 2000?  HOW? 

The Logan River Watershed Project will spend our state, local and mostly FEDERAL tax moneys if Congress approves. 

The price has ballooned from $ 90 million in~ 2021 to $150 million in 2024 to $309 million in 2026.
ASK yourself, is it fair for certain water-dependent sectors of our economy to continue to be subsidized while our rivers and the Great Salt Lake need the river water as much or more? 

LEASING un-needed water owned by water users to the GSL until it is needed locally could potentially provide revenue for upgraded infrastructure far more quickly than the LRWP.

Detailed plan is thousands of pages long and nearly impossible to understand.  With appendices, the DRAFT PLAN is thousands of pages long.  RESIDENTS have UNTIL AT LEAST JUNE 22 to comment.

Sponsors expect to withdraw water from the Logan RIVER from First Dam reservoir. This is miles upstream of current legal diversion points along the Little Logan River.  

At those diversion points, a lot of river water leaves the river channel, enters canals, irrigates farms and residences, generate hydropower in at least one business, and cools public buildings like the Bullen Center. 

Diversion points are currently at 800 East and 300 West for the largest canals.

Such transfers of river water into water rights traveling in canals are spelled out in detail in water-rights-documents like the Kimball decree. 

See the plan in map view below.  

UNDERSTANDING THE LRWP is hard:

the document is 2803 pages long!

The LRWP document is centered around one key map reproduced- with annotations- below.  

Understanding the complex plan and map requires more information.  

What is meant by the purple, red and blue-dashed lines below? Will they be dug up too.

Annotated main map figure from LRWP draft environmental project. Summary 

    This plan would reduce flows in all downstream reaches of the Main-stem Logan River and almost all parks along the Little Logan River, EXCEPT for one reach SW of Crockett structure that has a struggling fishery. The decimated fishery of the Little Logan River will not be improved because sponsors continue to incorrectly assert that the Little Logan River is a canal.

•     Amounts and percentages of flow reduction vary wildly, and are most severe in eastern parks and Logan High reaches. There, up to 95% reduction is predicted when comparing peak current discharges to expected discharges during the ongoing extreme and severe drought.

how most of the Little Logan River's natural river water currently flowing through our Island's premier parks would be diverted into pressurized pipes that supply west side lawn-watering and wetland farms.  

LEARN THAT residents will be encouraged to use our river water on lawns, how new users of river water are sought, how zero water conservation is in the project plan. 

Wed May 20th, Logan High, 6-8 pm.

We need everyone who cares about our city, parks, families, environmental to prepare and ask GOOD QUESTIONS:  

Two River Coalition would like to know:

    1) How much will this project cost the average family in service area each year-exclude grants and other extras? 

    Prior reports showed mandatory hook up fees between $360-840 a year plus one time system-conversion fee (many thousands?) plus fee for the river water used each season. 

BACKGROUND BASICS:  LRWP would cost at least $308,600,000 of your tax money.  IF funded, that money would not be available to pay for other more vital programs that have been slashed by the federal government.

LRWP price tag is at least 11 time more than a slightly less ambititous HIGHLINE canal rebuild that was installed 10-15 years ago in east part of Logan after collapsed hill-slope killed a family of three. 

The LRWWP has many goals.  Most central goal is to create from scratch an enormous and complex secondary irrigation system.   Installation would rip up almost every street in the service area, cost most families $500-1000 per year, and can only succeed if most homes and businesses chose to hook up.  

Conserving water is ALWAYS MORE EFFECTIVE AND LESS COSTLY than such wildly expensive infrastructure projects. See for example this report.  

    UNDER CONSTRUCTION: We plan to add more peer-reviewed research  showing how projected like the LRWP typcally "take water from the public, trees, plants and animals, parks, amenities of entire communities and nature, and downstream users" while diverting that water to new users of a certain kind. Increased "efficiency"  rarely occurs.

Other smaller and less costly aspects of the project.  North Logan needs canals to be "fixed" for storm water management.  Dangerous old and outdated irrigation infrastructure is dangerous and in need to updating. , mitigate flooding from canals in North Logan, and 

    2) Will cities require use of hook up to this extremely expensive secondary water system (costing $308,000,000, with overunrs expected) if too few voluntary users come forward?

    3) Will summer water flow in Little Logan River be kept high enough to for kids (5-12 cfs) and adults (>12 cfs) to continue tubing? (NO).

This is an MEGA-IRRIGATION PROJECT being pushed in a year of MEGA-Drought.  All of Utah is in extreme and severe drought conditions, with ~ 2.7 percent of Utah residents being lucky enough to live in moderate drought conditions.  DROUGHT is likely to worsen this summer.

The Public can finally review and comment on the LOGAN RIVER WATERSHED PROJECT (after 18 months of dead silence).

PLEASE comment on DRAFT Environmental Impact Statement. Information is here.

Check carefully that our community's interests are protected.

Moms and kids enjoying the Little Logan River in a threatened section of the Little Logan River. 
Merlin Olsen Park (above) to the Fairgrounds are apparently not being treated like a river that required protection by the State Engineer.

Let the sponsors of the project know your views:

Protests and comments on the Logan River Watershed Project Draft Plan-EIS can be submitted from May 8 to June 22, 2026, by mailing the USDA-NRCS or emailing ammon.boswell@usda.gov. Include "Logan River Draft Plan-EIS Comment" in the subject line to ensure your concerns regarding water flow, environmental impact, or property are documented." 

DEADLINE should be extended for public comment

  The legal document was not available on May 8 as the posting of the Draft EIS implied.  

It first appeared late on May 11, 3 days later.  

EVIDENCE:

ABOVE:  Screenshot of the Web page that posted the Draft EIS proposal.  It was updated on May 11th when the DEIS was posted.

That web site reports a May 8th posting but the posting occurred days later, with email notification after business hours. 

The public is owed extra day to file our reactions to this plan.

 The email announcement of it posting were ever more tardy. 

That occurred after business hours onMay 11 at 5:01 pm.  Effectively, the document was live on May 12th. 

THEREFORE the deadline must be revised to June 26th.  
  

Families using the Little Logan River for recreation

A public meeting is planned on May 20th, 6-8 pm auditorium of Logan High School.

Hopefully this meeting will be recorded and posted.

(The prior October 2025 meeting was not recorded or posted)

Please advocate for:

• year round water, (NOT INCLUDED)
• at least 10 cfs of summer flow (so most kids can continue to go tubing), (NOT INCLUDED)
• no new structures placed in the river bed. (TBD)
• Stop managing the Little log. n river like a canal.

Watering lawns with water from our river is unwise in this time of rising temps and mega-drought.

Watch for DRAFT EIS on the web site.

Time is short.

Ask for advice at WethePeopleCV@gmail.com

https://www.nrcs.usda.gov/state-offices/utah/logan-river-watershed-project

Let’s preserve and enhance our priceless amenity:

The Little Logan River

OR

"Treating a cat like a dog won't makes it bark”

Dr. Susanne Janecke, Sept 16, 2025

View video of typical summer flows in East reach of Little Logan River.  A small fraction of that flow would persist under LRWP.

Summary comments about the LOGAN RIVER WATERSHED PROJECT.  

This public works project has laudable goals to update outdated irrigation infrastructure of several canals that divert water north from the Little Logan River. 

Published plans for this project also UNNECESSARILY and very negatively dewater and mismanage the magnificent Little Logan River in our midst, in violation of Utah river law 73-3-29 

Logan, Utah, the Island, the Great Salt Lake, and east Cache Valley area between Hyde Park and the Logan River will all SUFFER from a project. 

The LRWP plans to divert almost all the Little Logan River's water upstream of the current legally-defined diversion points. River water would enter into pressurized pipes at First Dam Reservoir. As much as 80-90 cfs (or more?) of river water would no longer flow in the natural river. 

It also seeks new users that use EXTRA river water to water their residentical properties than now.  This could negatively impact our beautiful river and the Great Salt Lake if model-based predictions about "water-savings" resulting from piping are less than expected.

The project models that there would be less water lost to infiltration and evaporation after the expensive upgrade, so the withdrawals from the Logan River system might not increase. The actual result remains to be seen,

The Logan River Watershed Project 

must do more to:

+ACTUALLY and FULLY honor the public's rights, 

+preserve rivers and landscapes, 

+enhance our fabulous greenbelt of parks, 

+maintain sufficient open flow (>>8 cfs) of natural river water,

+restore winter river water to Logan, Utah’s rivers and Island area,

+and lease unused water rights to help prevent further collapse

of the Great Salt lake and Utah's economy.

KEY POINT:  THE LITTLE LOGAN RIVER IS A NATURAL RIVER--AND THIS EASILY PROVABLE FACT ENTITLES THE PUBLIC TO PROTECTIONS

There is overwhelming evidence that the Little Logan River is a natural river along its entire length.

See the FAQ in this post to see a summary of the evidence that experts use to prove that the river is a river along its entire length.

Problem statement:

The Little Logan River is a natural river, not a man-made canal. Plans to upgrade the canals that are fed by the river will degrade the Little Logan River unless its river status is protected, as required by law since the early 1970s. 

River status gives Little Logan River extra protection. Unfortunately, sponsors of Logan River Watershed Project appear to be planning and managing the Little Logan River as if it were a man-canal that can be modified at will.

A win-win solution is possible with ZERO impact on the water provided to existing or potential water users.  The excess unused water right (~ 45-55 cfs) could keep the Little Logan River healthy and satisfy the law. 

Key to this win-win solution is the fact that the Crockett Canal companies have rights to 140 cfs of river water at peak flows but there have been no users for more than 85 cfs in at least two decades. Records dating back to the 1970s show that the full allotment was NEVER in the Little Logan River on its way to canals. Peak flows have been below 100 cfs since 1997 and below 120 cfs since about 1987.

The large excess right is not being shared with the public that owns the water.

The Logan River Watershed Project is motivated by a desire to spend tax moneys (~135 million dollars) to find new users of the unused water right. 

With FAR TOO FEW USERS of the Crockett water rights, it is remarkable and noteworthy that the sponsors propose an extremely stingy amount of water for the Little Logan River.  

They propose that ZERO water flows in the Little Logan River during droughts and a maximum of 10 cfs during unspecified conditions. 

Grinches all!

TLTLTLTLTLTLTL

Sponsors have erroneously claimed that most of the Little Logan River is a canal. This claim is critical for sponsors to perpetrate the alarming degradation planned, with limited transparency, to our incredible river. (Many updates since October 2024 have not been shared with the public)

The last updated version of the Logan River Watershed Project does not treat the Little Logan river as a river, with required legal protections. It appears that sponsors have barely considered the law or the public’s rights in their planning.

Yet the public was assured REPEATEDLY that the plan for upgrading infrastructure does not damage the Little Logan River. Sadly those assurances never matched with posted documents later posted to describe the project, nor with checks of other facts.  

The Little Logan river will not be healthy unless it has enough water to sustain its current uses, including very popular water sports by families, cooling, environmental functions and fish begin to return to this river. 10-15 cfs guaranteed in the summer along the entire river would accomplish this public benefit. 

The published plan for the Little Logan River promises to limit water flows in the Little Logan River to a very low and worrisome range of ZERO to TEN cfs. 

Sponsors have told us that they are not legally permitted to allow water to continue to flow in the river bed after the irrigation season ends in October.

The assertion/myth/speculation/ of the river being a canal was seemingly never tested against the legal, geologic, regulatory or historic evidence. 

TLTLTLTLTLTLT

 All rivers have additional protections that canals do not have (Utah code 73-3-29).  That law requires that there must be a balance of water rights and the public's rights to recreation, a healthy environment and aquatic species.  

The public rights to a healthy natural river would be well-served if adults were able to tube in the river without going aground (~15 cfs flowing) and winter desiccation ends so that fish can reestablish.  

 Qr code helps you to share the report

By Dr. Susanne Janecke

Updated July 2025

Return to this information portal

Tinyurl.com/savellr 

Tinyurl.com/RESTORELLR

SKIP AHEAD TO A POWERPOINT TALK (5 minutes) about the Little Logan river's precarious future (use find "talk").