Irrigation Infrastructure Resource Hub

The Ditch and Reservoir Company Alliance (DARCA) works closely with irrigators and other water providers in regards to advocacy, resource accessibility, and as a network for organizations to provide additional support. Irrigators have indicated that they need additional support to overcome challenges such as a lack of capacity to create a multi-benefit project, to write and manage grants and other funding streams, and to navigate system modernization with all of the challenges that a ditch company may face. 

River Network, a sponsor and partner of DARCA, found similar challenges arose in their conversations around stream management planning and other projects. In response to this need, River Network launched a two-year pilot program to provide agriculture organizations in two regions that were identified as having a gap in capacity: the Yampa and Southwest basins. The pilot provides resources to organizations in these two regions to build capacity to increase the quantity and quality of multi-benefit projects on private lands. 

This resource hub provides a one-stop-shop for resources to irrigators and other DARCA members and stakeholders and allows a ditch, reservoir, or irrigation company or stakeholder the opportunity to gather resources for additional capacity building and to gather ways to take a project from single benefit to multi-benefit that also modernizes the system to cut down on maintenance costs while creating many benefits to the overall system.