Even with the best intentions, the companies and cities that own canals cannot fix them so they never would fail, because neighbors, developers, rodents or trees could destabilize them, a state official warned Tuesday.

And even if all the risky spots along Utah's 6,600 miles of irrigation canals were identified, that's not necessarily where they would collapse, said Dennis Strong, director of the Utah Division of Water Resources.

"You don't know where the gopher is going to be," Strong said during a meeting of the state Executive Water Task Force.

The burrowing creature could serve as a metaphor for the elusive goal of ensuring safety in the aftermath of the canal collapse and landslide in July that killed a Logan family.

Countless committees through the years have struggled with canal safety, said Sterling Brown, the Utah Farm Bureau official who heads a subcommittee that reported to the task force.

But with just one meeting left this year before tackling new measures to be introduced at the 2010 Legislature, Brown suggested a methodical approach that would involve gathering data, setting up public-private partnerships, hunting for funding and mounting an education campaign on the need for canal companies to carry insurance.

Right now, 70 percent to 75 percent of canal companies operating in Utah are not insured, Brown said, a rate that improved only slightly after the Davis & Weber Canal breach 10 years ago sent about 350,000 cubic yards of sandy mud spilling through a Riverdale subdivision. The slide destroyed homes, forced neighbors to live elsewhere temporarily and cut irrigation to farms.

But no one died -- unlike the Logan disaster, which killed Jacqueline Leavey and her two children, Victor and Abbey Alanis.

The task force has decided not to identify canals as "high risk." Rather, the panel proposed mapping all 6,600 miles and identifying "areas of interest." That would come, Brown said, after literally walking the banks in a search for trouble spots.

The group -- composed of canal-company officials, water lawyers and elected and appointed officials -- remained adamant that it preferred a bottom-up solution to canal problems and wanted to avoid pointing fingers when analyzing what happened in Logan.