Utah
‘It’s past the eleventh hour’: Utah and other Colorado River states call for mediation as current plans near expiration
ST. GEORGE — As negotiations over the Colorado River remain at a standstill, Utah and other states in the Upper Basin are asking for outside help.
Negotiators from Utah, Colorado, New Mexico and Wyoming called for “immediate mediation” among the seven states that share the Colorado River and the federal government, according to a statement from the Upper Colorado River Commission last week.
“It’s past the eleventh hour. It’s 11:59,” Estevan López, New Mexico’s negotiator, said during a commission meeting on April 21 while discussing the looming deadline for new operating plans for the river that provides water to roughly 40 million people.
Current guidelines for managing the river system and its reservoirs during dry times expire this year. The Bureau of Reclamation is currently going through an environmental review process and has said it must have a new plan in place by Oct. 1. If the states reach consensus, the bureau has said they will choose that as its preferred path forward.
The states have failed to agree, though, missing two federal deadlines over the past six months.
“I think it would be worth all of us stepping back from this and seeking to get a mediated solution to solve this really difficult problem,” López said.
So far, the bureau has facilitated negotiations among the states. López acknowledged the agency’s “good” attempts but also said that the bureau is “not an independent entity in this discussion.”
“Reclamation has a really important interest in the outcome,” he said. “They obviously operate the reservoirs. Reclamation and the Secretary of Interior are the river master in the Lower Basin. Interior serves in a trust responsibility for the tribes throughout the basin.”
Utah’s negotiator, Gene Shawcroft, said that he agreed with López and that “it’s extremely disappointing” that the states haven’t reached a resolution yet.
“It’s critical for us to continue to work together,” he added. “A seven-state solution will still be much better than any other alternative.”
The Upper Basin states are in discussions with the bureau and the Lower Basin states — Arizona, California and Nevada — about developing a mediation process currently, the commission said in an email to The Tribune on Wednesday.
John Entsminger, Nevada’s negotiator, said he’s “open to bringing on an independent mediator” but that he’s also disappointed that the states’ seven representatives “can’t come up with a common-sense solution.”
“But mediation beats litigation,” he added. “So if there’s a chance this helps break the logjam, then tell me when and where to be.”
The idea of a mediator has surfaced in river negotiations “a handful of times” over the past two decades, Entsminger said. But in the past the negotiators were able to come to “a mutually agreeable solution where everybody gives a little,” he added.
That hasn’t happened this time around. “I think it’s become more difficult for the states to agree, because the magnitude of the problem has increased,” he said.
Much of the Colorado River Basin experienced its worst snowpack and hottest winter on record. The bureau and Upper Basin states reached an agreement to release up to 1 million acre-feet of water from Flaming Gorge this year to prevent Lake Powell from reaching minimum power pool — the level at which the dam can no longer generate hydropower or sustainably send water downstream.
California proposed a mediator last year, JB Hamby, California’s negotiator, told The Tribune in an email.
“However, effective mediation requires common ground, and the system cannot wait,” he added. “Current conditions require immediate, measurable water reductions from every state.”
The Arizona Department of Water Resources said it had no comment at this time.
How a third party could help
Bringing in a mediator “makes total sense” to help states get past politics and personalities and reach a solution, said John Berggren, a regional policy manager on Colorado River issues for Western Resource Advocates.
“I kind of wish it would have happened two-plus years ago,” he added, “but some of the fundamental challenges that they’re facing come down to trust and communication … and not taking each other’s proposals seriously.”
The drawn out negotiations have put states in an unpredictable situation that makes finding a solution more difficult, said Danya Rumore, director of the Environmental Dispute Resolution Program at the University of Utah.
“Our options get more limited,” she said. “People are more likely to be entrenched. We get more fear in the conversation, and that makes it harder to actually productively deal with it. It doesn’t make it impossible, it just gives you one more thing you have to contend with.”
A trained third-party facilitator — or team of facilitators — would ideally create a process that helps people learn how to productively work through conflict while also integrating the complex science, legal frameworks and uncertainties involved in this issue, Rumore said.
“If somebody can’t understand the legal elements of what’s going on there, they don’t understand the scientific elements enough to be able to facilitate those conversations, that can create huge challenges,” she added.
Rumore and her co-workers jokingly call themselves “the group mom.” That means both getting things done and seeing what’s emotionally happening in the room.
“We have to stay regulated,” she said. “We have to stay present. We have to not go into this crisis thinking mode. And that’s going to help us get a good outcome.”
If the states do bring in a third party, Entsminger said he hopes it’s “somebody that could inject some objectiveness into the entire process because we’ve got some entrenched people. There’s no doubt about that.”
He said he thinks the states will come up with a short-term, two- or three-year operating plan this year while they continue hashing out a long-term plan.
This article is published through the Colorado River Collaborative, a solutions journalism initiative supported by the Janet Quinney Lawson Institute for Land, Water, and Air at Utah State University. See all of our stories about how Utahns are impacted by the Colorado River at greatsaltlakenews.org/coloradoriver.
UTAH, April 30, 2026 (Gephardt Daily) — The Utah Department of Natural Resources Law Enforcement Division has revealed that one turkey hunter was shot by another during opening weekend of the hunting season.
“Opening weekend should be about the thrill of the hunt and the quiet of the woods,” the news release says. “Instead, it served as a harrowing reminder of how quickly a mistake can turn a hunt into a tragedy.
“During the opening of the limited-entry turkey season, a hunter was shot and required emergency medical treatment. The victim was positioned in vegetation behind their decoys. Another hunter, spotting the decoys, stalked in and fired—hitting the hunter concealed behind them.”
Unlike most big game seasons, turkey hunting does not require hunters to wear blaze orange, the release says.
“This makes visual identification your #1 responsibility. ‘I think it’s a bird’” isn’t good enough. You must positively identify the beard and the bird.
“Every round has a destination. If your target is in thick brush or near decoys, be aware of the ‘blind spots’ behind them.”
If you hear a gobble or see movement, wait, the statement says.
“Never fire at a flash of color or a movement in the brush. If you see another hunter approaching your setup, do not move. Speak up in a loud, clear voice to announce your location.
“The goal is to bring home a bird, but the priority is making sure everyone makes it home for dinner. Stay sharp, stay visible when moving, and always—always—confirm your shot.”
No additional information was released about the location of the shooting or the condition of the hunter hit.
Utah
How Jaren Kump used extra eligibility to earn a master’s degree that he hopes will help retiring college athletes
This article was first published in the Ute Insiders newsletter. Sign up to receive the newsletter in your inbox each Wednesday night.
Jaren Kump is a rarity in the modern age of college sports.
The former Utah offensive lineman spent six consecutive years with the Utes, playing every spot on the offensive line along the way.
Kump was a staple on the offensive line from the beginning, starting all five games during the COVID-19-shortened season in his freshman year. Over the years, he played wherever he was needed, and by the 2024 campaign, locked down the starting center job — a position he held through his senior season with the Utes.
Kump credited the positional versatility he experienced during his college career for helping him become a better lineman.
“It helped me a lot, especially playing center, having to be the quarterback of the offensive line, having to communicate every single play, having to read defenses and make adjustments based off what we see, based off game plan, based on whatever play we’re doing, situation,” Kump said.
“And then knowing exactly how my other guys, how their technique and what they’re seeing, knowing exactly what their game is also like, having done it myself, helped a ton.”
Kump, one of the oldest players on Utah’s roster, originally committed to the Utes back in 2017 out of Herriman High.
“I felt like it was the best place for me in terms of football and whatnot. When I told Utah I was going to come there and I signed my letter of intent there, it was important to me that I kept my word,” Kump said.
After serving a mission for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Brazil, Kump arrived back in Salt Lake City ahead of the 2020 season, which, due to the COVID-19 pandemic, would be a season like no other.
Over half of Utah’s games were canceled. Due to the circumstances, every player that was on the roster for that season received an extra year of eligibility.
Kump’s career would hit another bump in the road in 2021. After starting in every game in 2020 at right tackle, Kump started four of Utah’s first five games before suffering a season-ending injury.
Over his next four seasons, Kump was a key part of Utah’s success along the offensive line, and remained loyal to the Utes, even as offers from other schools came.
“Throughout my time at Utah for six years, of course, there was opportunity to go somewhere else and maybe make more money. And me and my wife, of course, we had conversations about that,” Kump said. “I think being responsible adults, there is room for conversation in that.”
In the end, Kump and his wife, Sydney, decided they’d only consider leaving Utah if Kump wasn’t getting enough playing time.
“Leaving for NIL purposes or stuff like that, we felt like that wasn’t the right thing to do. Plus, Utah did a good job at taking care of us anyway. We fell in love with Utah and we wanted to stay because we wanted to keep our word. That was the right thing to do,” Kump said.
Staying at Utah gave Kump the opportunity to be part of some of the highest peaks in Utah football history, including back-to-back Pac-12 championships in 2021 and 2022. Kump pointed to Utah’s 43-42 win over USC in 2022 as one of his favorite moments as a Ute, saying he had never heard Rice-Eccles Stadium as loud as it was when Cam Rising scored the game-winning two-point conversion.
Kump’s final game at Rice-Eccles, a 51-47 comeback win over Kansas State, is another memory he’ll cherish from his Utah career.
“That was another moment I heard Rice-Eccles Stadium erupt in the way that it’s known. Those are two moments I will never forget,” he said.
A high school coach gives Kump direction
As he began college, like a good chunk of university students, Kump didn’t know what he wanted to do post-football. He called his high school strength coach for advice, and in a lengthy conversation, he suggested that Kump could become a strength coach like him.
“Leaving for NIL purposes or stuff like that, we felt like that wasn’t the right thing to do. Plus, Utah did a good job at taking care of us anyway. We fell in love with Utah and we wanted to stay because we wanted to keep our word. That was the right thing to do.”
— Utah center Jaren Kump
“He explained to me, ‘You love training. Every time you come in, you’re passionate about what you do, you’re passionate about learning why you’re doing things, so why don’t you go and study for that?’ I’m like, ‘That’s a great idea,’ and so strength and conditioning is the kind of motivation to pursue kinesiology,” Kump said.
While some, including this reporter, might have thought that Kump’s extensive experience with strength and conditioning, injury management and personal training from college football would give him a leg up in the classroom, he said that it was actually the reverse.
“Being able to understand why we’re doing things really helps a lot when undergoing training and having to make adjustments based off of, say, injury or, say, tweaks here and there,” Kump said.
Though his first two years at Utah were anything but ideal on the field, he turned a negative situation to a positive one off the field, deciding to pursue a master’s degree with his two years of extra eligibility after graduating with his bachelor’s degree in kinesiology in 2023.
“I’m already here. I got a couple more years left. Might as well shoot for a master’s degree because if I don’t try to shoot for it, I know I’ll regret it for the rest of my life,” Kump said.
‘Be where your feet are’
In an era of college football where players are making big money and the sport is more and more professionalized with each passing year, it’s easy to forget that the players are full-time students as well.
Combining essentially a full-time job in college football with the intensive nature of a master’s program isn’t easy. According to Utah health and kinesiology associate professor Tanya Halliday, just 3% of Division I athletes pursue a graduate degree.
Kump segmented his two lives in his mind, which helped him manage his time well.
“Being where your feet are is something I learned while being a student-athlete as well. When I’m in school, when I’m doing my graduate studies, I’m working on my thesis, I’m not a football player. I’m 100% a student, I’m 100% a graduate student or whatever that entails,” Kump said.
“I’m not thinking about football, I’m not thinking about the mistakes I made in practice, I’m not thinking about how I can correct them, I’m 100% a student. And the same goes for football. You be where your feet are.”
With his background as a football player, Kump’s master’s degree thesis fittingly focused on the health and wellness challenges that Division I athletes face as they retire from sports.
“There’s a lot of data out there to suggest that student-athletes, as they retire, especially on the Division I level,” Kump said. “They’re experiencing a typhoon, a lot of negative health consequences and those include things such as lower rates of physical activity and even fitness compared to their nonathletic counterparts, a lower quality of nutrition and knowledge, an increased effect on their injuries, on their prolonging injuries as they continue into retirement and even increased rates of obesity.”
There’s also the mental health aspect, including a decreased sense of self-identity and mood.
Over the course of his master’s degree, Kump was able to survey hundreds of student-athletes to find out more about these health outcomes.
“A big piece that we saw is current student-athletes are anticipating the challenges of retirement very accurately based on the lived experiences of former student-athletes,” he said. “That would tell us that these student-athletes are kind of seeing these challenges coming. It’s not like they’re experiencing anything drastically different versus what they expected.”
Another big finding for Kump was the decline in self-efficacy of retired athletes.
“I would say the biggest challenge of what they saw was their self-efficacy in different areas, especially in self-efficacy and being able to manage their sport-related injuries. That was a huge piece that we saw as a challenge to them,” Kump said.
That showed up in other areas, like maintaining a physical health program and managing their mental health.
According to an article from University of Utah Health, this project is just beginning. Later, another student will build on Kump’s findings, using the data to “develop a deeper qualitative study and continue the work.”
Continuing his football dream in Chicago
Ahead of the NFL draft, Kump had a busy month. He trained for and participated in Utah’s pro day in front of NFL scouts, spoke with NFL teams and even got in some training sessions with Utah offensive line coach Jordan Gross and offensive lineman Isaiah Kema.
Just days before the NFL draft, Kump received his master’s degree in kinesiology — a major achievement.
“The thing that I found probably most rewarding was honestly getting it done, feeling relieved of getting it done, doing what I knew was going to be very, very difficult, but I knew that I could do it if I really put my mind to it,” Kump said.
Over the three days of the NFL draft, Kump experienced a roller coaster of emotions.
“Anywhere between excitement, anger, frustration, a little bit of sadness,” he said.
Though he was not selected in the seven-round draft, he was the first Ute to sign an NFL free-agent contact, inking a deal with the Chicago Bears.
“As soon as we made a deal with the Chicago Bears, it was just a sense of relief. It felt like a weight was lifted off my shoulders and just washed away down the river. I’m super relieved and I’m excited for the opportunity now that we have an exact pinpointed place that we’re going, I can kind of focus on that now,” Kump said.
The whirlwind is just beginning for Kump. He’s packing up and moving to Chicago, where the Bears will hold rookie mini-camp at the start of May. At the end of May, the Bears will have team OTAs, followed by team-wide mini-camp in June.
This time period is critical for Kump, who is trying to make the active roster.
“I’m very excited to go and just work my tail off and to be able to hopefully make a name for myself to get a roster spot,” he said.
Kump arrives in Chicago with a wealth of experience from his six seasons in college, and he feels like playing at Utah has set him up well for the NFL experience.
“I would say from what I understand, how the NFL structures practices and layout of everything and coaching styles and how decisions are made, a common theme I keep hearing from older guys that come back and talk to us is that it’s very similar to how Utah runs things and it helped prepare them in ways that they didn’t understand, they didn’t know at the time when they were in college,” Kump said.
Kump hopes he will have a lengthy NFL career, but when his time to retire from football comes, he plans to still be around the sport, putting his degree to use as a strength and conditioning coach or a position coach.
“After my football career, hopefully that lasts for some years, but whenever that is, either strength and conditioning or I’ve even thought about being a position coach. … I do know that having a master’s degree does help with that as well, having that on your résumé,” Kump said.
In case you missed it
Former Ute offensive tackle Spencer Fano was selected by the Cleveland Browns with the No. 9 pick in the 2026 NFL draft, while fellow offensive tackle Caleb Lomu was selected by the New England Patriots with the No. 28 pick.
From the archives
Extra points
PRE-GAME
Projected Lineup – Utah
Keller – Schmaltz – Crouse
Yamamoto – Cooley – Guenther
Kerfoot – Hayton – Carcone
Peterka – Stenlund – Tanev
Sergachev – Weegar
Schmidt – Marino
Cole – Durzi
Vejmelka
Projected Lineup – Vegas
Barbashev – Eichel – Howden
R. Smith – Marner – Stone
Dorofeyev – Hertl – Kolesar
C. Smith – Dowd – Sissons
McNabb – Theodore
Hanifin – Andersson
Lauzon – Korczak
Hart
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