41-3-1008. Regulation of streams.
(a) The game and fish commission shall report to the water development commission the need to regulate a stream to protect the priority of an instream flow right. The report shall include information establishing present or future damage to the fishery if the stream is not regulated. The commission, on the next working day, shall submit the report to the state engineer and call for stream regulation. The state engineer shall not regulate the stream to protect the instream flow right:
(i) Unless present or future injury to the fishery has been shown;
(ii) If the call for regulation is a futile call; or
(iii) If the call for regulation will impair senior water rights.