Timeline

1942

Colorado, Kansas and Nebraska sign the compact. Colorado gets 11 percent of the river water, Nebraska 49 percent and Kansas 40 percent.

2002

Supreme Court approves a settlement in which compact accounting will be based on five-year averages.

2003-2006

Colorado has failed to deliver, on average, 11,000 acre-feet of water a year to Kansas. Farmers pay a fee of $5.50 per acre to partially fund a federal program, CREP, that has paid farmers to retire 29,430 irrigated acres.

October 2007

Colorado will announce new measures that could shut more wells and retire an additional 30,000 irrigated acres.