STATEMENT OF HAROLD E. WALLACE, CHAIRMAN, LEGISLATIVE COMMITTEE, NATIONAL RECLAMATION ASSOCIATION Mr. WALLACE. Mr. Chairman, gentlemen of the Senate, I merely want to make a very brief statement of appreciation for the fine consideration you have given to reclamation and to the matters which the Legislative Committee of the National Reclamation Association have sponsored. As you have stated this morning, the small projects bill was passed by this body, by the Senate, and had previously been approved by this body, and that is indicative of much of the legislation concerning reclamation by your committee and the Senate, and we want to express appreciation to you for what you have done, and what you are doing. You have already in this early session shown your intentions by the two matters on which the chairman at the opening of this meeting indicated action had already been taken. We are also very much pleased with the fact that the small projects bill has been introduced and sponsored by Senator Moss and others, and we want to express appreciation for the consideration you have given to the legislation proposed and sponsored and in which we are very much interested. I thank you. Senator ANDERSON. Thank you for the kind words you had to say for the members of this committee. We are all people who are interested in your problems, and I am going to say it because reclamation could not be tried before a fairer jury, except the jurors are a little bit prejudiced in your behalf. Mr. WALLACE. Thank you. Mr. SHAMBERGER. Thank you. Mr. Chairman, for a final statement, I am going to call on our executive director, Mr. William E. Welsh. Bill. Senator ANDERSON. Always glad to have you, Mr. Welsh. We appreciate your being here this morning. STATEMENT OF WILLIAM E. WELSH, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, NATIONAL RECLAMATION ASSOCIATION Mr. WELSH. Mr. Chairman, members of the committee, it is a pleasure for me to have the privilege of appearing before you again at this time. First, I would like to say that I would like to join in what others have said, including Mr. Shamberger, that we do appreciate Senator SIMPSON. Excuse me. Would you pull the microphone a little closer to you, please? We can't hear you. Mr. WELSH. Yes, sir. I would like to join with Mr. Shamberger and others who have said that we do very deeply appreciate the courtesies and the assistance and cooperation which we have received from this committee over a long period of years, and I know all the time that I have been in Washington, which is 16 years, and ever farther back than that, we do appreciate it. I want to say, too, that we appreciated the very vigorous support that was given to our reclamation program by Senator Moss while he was serving as chairman of this subcommittee, and par his active interest in and support of our small projects legisla then I want to say to you, Senator Anderson, that it seems times and good times to us to have you back here as chairm subcommittee, because we recognized in you one of the rea in our reclamation movement of the West, and we did appre still do, the support which you have given to our reclama gram over the years. The president assigned me the subject of authorizations, a little bit like the Californian who could not resist every opp saying something about the weather in California; it is dif me to lead into the subject of authorizations without sayi word or two about reclamation. I look upon the reclamation program as the greatest prog was ever conceived and carried into action by the Federal in the interests of the growth and development of the pros this Nation. I really feel that very deeply, and I think it program. I feel that those who would have us cancel out of reclamation program, because of agricultural surpluses in so fail to see the total picture as to what reclamation has mea West and to the Nation. Every population center in the West, with the possible of a few along the Pacific coast, has as a basis for its founda its beginning the development of reclamation projects. reclamation, a large part of the West would be practically th it was when the Indians abdicated it, and left it to us nearly a years ago. We owe a lot to reclamation, and there is nothi opinion that will mean as much, be as great a factor in de the future growth and development of prosperity of the W thereby affecting the entire Nation, as the continuation in a manner of our reclamation program for the West. One point that is so often overlooked is that reclamat longer a single-purpose program as it was 60 years ago. Re now includes multipurpose development which means every use of the waters within a river basin. And we all recog people recognize over the Nation as a whole now, the serio our nationwide water problem, and in the West, the develo our water resources must tie in with our reclamation dev in that area. There are several points that are overlooked. I am go over them just very briefly. In the first place, America is without doubt one of the b the best fed, nation in the world, but too many people do n that most of the fresh fruits and the vegetables which we joyed every day throughout the entire year come from the re projects of the West. Furthermore, the crops that are grown on reclamation pr with one or two exceptions, not the crops that are both surplus. Probably the only crop that is really bothersom grown to any extent on reclamations is the cotton, and m crops that are grown on reclamation projects are crops tha and that are very much in demand. Our population, we don't need to repeat this, but it is at a tremendous rate. Not only is it increasing, but our p is moving westward. Furthermore, we are losing, still losing, agricultural land. The first survey that was made by the Soil Conservation Service on this subject was in 1955 in response to a request that was made by our association. The Soil Conservation Service found then and they still maintain that to be true. Just yesterday Mr. Donald Williams appeared before our board of directors and said that we are still moving in that same direction, that is, that we are losing a million acres a year of our good agricultural or farm land. Another point that is too often overlooked is that it takes from 10 to 25 years from the time a reclamation project is authorized until it is brought into actual production. Now as to the subject of authorizations, I do not want to sound critical. If there is any criticism at all, then the National Reclamation Association should step forward as the first to be criticized, but we have fallen behind during the last 7 or 8 years in the authorization of reclamation projects in the West. I think the average for the last 8 years, the average total authorizations are about $179 million, and one year we got down as low as $2 million in the total authorizations; and now, as a result of that situation, we are finding ourselves confronted with a tremendous backlog of projects coming in from practically every State in the West-projects that are urgently needed in their respective areas, and strongly supported by the people living in those communities. The Bureau of Reclamation have given me a tabulation, a listing of those projects, projects which they have now submitted to the Congress, and projects which they expect to submit to the Congress during this first session. And that, I realize, is a tremendous job, to do the authorization of such a backlog of projects. It puts us in a very difficult situation. I know, from our experience with this committee over the years, how deeply interested you are in this problem, and I want to assure you that we will do everything that we possibly can to assist in bringing about the orderly development of that tremendous backlog of projects now confronting us. Again, I want to thank you. First, I would like to say this: Mr Chairman, I think the word that describes the need before us today was a word that you used very effectively some 4 or 5 years ago, when you were pointing out the need to accelerate the reclamation program, and I think that is the urgent need before us at this time. Again, I do want to thank you for the privilege of appearing before you not only today, but on the numerous occasions on which I have been here in the past. Thank you very much. Senator ANDERSON. Mr. Welsh, before you leave the stand where you testified, I just want to say, as I have frequently said, it has been a great joy to work with you through the years. You have been here, I think, 16 years. Mr. WELSH. Yes, sir. Senator ANDERSON. I have been a member of this committee 16 years and during all those years you have been a very fine person to work with, and as one individual on the committee, I want to thank you for all the fine contributions you have made to the cause of reclamation. It has been a real pleasure. Mr. WELSH. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Senator Moss. May I echo that, Mr. Chairman? Work Mr. WELSH. Thank you. Senator ANDERSON. Thank you, Senator Moss. Senator JORDAN. Mr. Chairman, may I add my voice to y I appreciate their coming, and look forward to it from Senator ANDERSON. I want the individual members of t It has been a very pleasant and profitable experience to Senator SIMPSON. Mr. Chairman. Senator ANDERSON. Senator Simpson. Senator SIMPSON. Do I feel from what Mr. Welsh has Senator ANDERSON. Well, I do think we ought to point We have a budget problem that we constantly wrestle w I just hope they do keep coming, as you have pointed o Mr. WELSH. Thank you. Mr. SHAMBERGER. Thank you very much. (Whereupon, at 11:30 a.m., the committee adjourned.) O |