Interior Secretary Gale Norton announced Monday that she will maintain water releases from Lake Powell at their current levels because of above-average precipitation in the Colorado River Basin during the 2005 water year, which ran from October through the end of March.

In doing so, Norton averted a showdown with lower-basin states Nevada, Arizona and California, which vigorously opposed proposals to reduce flows out of Lake Powell below the 8.23 million acre-feet of water they annually receive - and may have legally challenged her had she opted to deliver something less than that.

But in the process Norton also dismayed the upper-basin states - Utah, Wyoming, Colorado and New Mexico - which argued for a lesser release in a bid to refill Lake Powell, which has been drained to just 34 percent of its capacity after six years of drought. By contrast, Lake Mead, in the lower basin, is at about 62 percent of capacity.

Norton reiterated her authority to reduce flows out of Powell if conditions warrant it next year and ordered up a meeting of state and federal water officials by the end of the month to begin wrestling with long-term management issues on the Colorado.

Nevertheless, "we're disappointed," said Don Ostler, executive director of the Upper Colorado River Commission. "We felt like conditions this year warranted increased storage in Lake Powell. The risk of this being an average year in a long, continuing drought like this one is quite high. Spike years like these are normal. And because of that, the upper basin remains at great risk."

But Larry Anderson, the director of Utah's Division of Water Resources, says Norton made the decision he expected her to make all along. Runoff in the Colorado River's upper basin is projected to be 106 percent of normal this spring - or roughly double what it has been during the drought years. A rainy-day fund for Powell sounds good, he says, but probably was not practical.

"Even though there was a good argument to be made in terms of cutting the releases, Powell is still going to go up 50 feet and gain 4 million acre-feet of water above what we had last year," said Anderson. "So I think the issue is, was there a justification to make a change, and there probably wasn't.

"Even though Mead has more water than Powell, if the runoff continues to be normal next year, the two reservoirs will be roughly equal - 13 to 14 million acre-feet. I think that's some of the logic [Norton] used," Anderson added.

Though the lower-basin states experienced even heavier precipitation between October and March - over 200 percent of normal in many areas - water officials there said taking a reduction from Powell in this particular year would have been unacceptable. As things stand, Powell will refill to 49 percent of capacity by the end of the year, while Mead will drop by about 20 feet to just over 57 percent capacity.

"I wouldn't have disagreed [with a reduction] if there was a real need to do something," said Pat Mulroy, general manager of the Southern Nevada Water Authority. "But if you're going to change the long-term objective, the hydrology has to warrant it."

Interior Department officials said Monday that power and recreation industry concerns weighed heavily on Norton.

Power officials estimated losses of $9 million to $10 million based upon a projected reduction of 500,000 acre-feet out of Glen Canyon Dam, plus another $2.5 million loss because of reduced hydropower capacity at Lake Mead. Boating and marina companies on Lake Mead also complained about the impacts of a water reduction on them.

Upper-basin water officials say they take consolation in Norton's affirmation of her authority to impose shortages on the Colorado, and her commitment to finding solutions to the long-range challenges of managing the river.

"At a minimum, these consultations should address the development of guidelines for lower basin shortages and conjunctive management of Lake Powell and Lake Mead," she said in a statement.

Whether that will actually happen anytime soon is another question. The upper- and lower-basin states struggled to find agreement on their own after being ordered to do so by Norton in December, and were at a stalemate when they left a last-ditch meeting in Las Vegas last week.

But as long as the two sides continue to talk, Upper Colorado Commission director Ostler says there is a reasonable chance an agreement can be hatched.

"We need to figure out, when we're in a drought, when to release less than the 8.23 million [acre-feet] and how to operate the reservoirs in the most efficient manner," he said. "As long as that remains in place, this is not a lost opportunity."

jbaird@sltrib.com