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A fight over river access is playing out in Colorado, where an 81-year-old fly fisherman is suing the state to try to win anglers access to navigable rivers.
The New York Times profiles Roger Hill, a retired nuclear weapons scientist who likes to fish on the Arkansas River. In the town of Cotopaxi, a landowner ordered Hill to leave the river, which Hill asserts he has every right to fish in.
According to federal law, states own the title to all navigable rivers—defined as waterways used as “highways for commerce” at the time of statehood. Despite historical evidence that the Arkansas River was used commercially, the State of Colorado has never defined navigability.
University of Colorado Law professor Mark Squillace, who is representing Hill in his lawsuit, says that makes Colorado “a total outlier” in the West. “Standing in the bed of the river is something the U.S. Supreme Court has explicitly guaranteed, and the idea that Colorado would try to deny those rights, which are enjoyed by the citizens of every other state, is pretty shocking.”
On the other side of the lawsuit, Colorado Attorney General Phil Weiser, backed by agriculture and real estate groups, argues that Hill lacks standing to bring the case. The State Supreme Court could hold a trial this fall.
New Mexico sided with fishermen
A similar legal fight played out in New Mexico this year, where the State Supreme Court last week detailed its reasoning for a decision that restored stream access across the state. The state Game Commission had issued regulations allowing property owners to close access to waters on their land, and the Court invalidated that rule from the bench in March.
In New Mexico, all water within the state belongs to the public, but the land underneath may be owned privately. The Court found that the right to use that publicly owned water also gives anglers the right to touch privately owned land beneath.
“Walking and wading on the privately owned beds beneath public water is reasonably necessary for the enjoyment of many forms of fishing and recreation,” the Court wrote last week. “Having said that, we stress that the public may neither trespass on privately owned land to access public water, nor trespass on privately owned land from public water.”
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