As ordered reported by the Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources on June 18, 2014
S. 1771 would modify features of the Crooked River Project located in central Oregon and prioritize how water from the project would be allocated for different uses. Based on information from the Bureau of Reclamation, CBO estimates that enacting S. 1771 would increase offsetting receipts (which are treated as reductions in direct spending) by $1 million over the 2014-2024 period; therefore, pay-as-you-go procedures apply. The legislation would not affect revenues or spending subject to appropriation.
The main features of the Crooked River Project include the Bowman Dam, the Prineville Reservoir, and the Ochoco Dam and Reservoir located in the Ochoco Irrigation District. Enacting two provisions of S. 1771 would reduce direct spending over the next 10 years. Those provisions would:
Require the city of Prineville to pay the Bureau of Reclamation for 5,100 acre feet of water to be released annually from the Prineville Reservoir. Based on information from the bureau, CBO estimates that those payments would amount to $1 million over the 2015-2024 period; and
Authorize landowners in the Ochoco Irrigation District to prepay certain construction costs of the Crooked River Project. Those landowners currently owe the bureau $270,000, and CBO estimates that if they exercised the prepayment option under the bill net receipts to the government would increase by less than $8,000 over the 2015-2024 period.
CBO estimates that implementing other provisions of the bill would have no significant effect on the federal budget.
S. 1771 contains no intergovernmental or private-sector mandates as defined in the Unfunded Mandates Reform Act and would impose no costs on state, local, or tribal governments. Public entities, such as local governments and irrigation districts, would benefit from greater access to federal water resources and the development of hydropower. Any costs to those entities would be incurred as conditions of federal aid.
On August 2, 2013, CBO transmitted a cost estimate for H.R. 2640, the Central Oregon Jobs and Water Security Act, as ordered reported by the House Committee on Natural Resources on July 24, 2013. The two pieces of legislation are similar and CBO’s estimates of their costs are the same.
