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Show JANUARY ON CAPITOL HILL 81 Saylor stated that only once in its fifty-two year history had the Reclamation Bureau built a project for the original cost estimate.98 Larson shook his head, and Saylor told him sternly that the Bureau's own records confirmed that in half a century the Bureau's original cost records had doubled on the average. Therefore, Saylor continued, if that were true in the past, what was the situation with regard to the crsp? If the original cost estimate was to be doubled, what had Larson to say about power rates it would be neces- sary to charge to pay out the crsp within the time set in the pay-out schedules. Larson didn't know. He conceded that if the costs were doubled, power rate increases would be necessary. Saylor wanted to know why the Bureau had used one system to figure costs in the 1950 crsp plan (interest component) and another system to figure costs in 1954 (Collbran Formula). And why was three per cent in- terest used in the first case and only 2 V2 per cent in the second? Larson believed that in the first instance the three per cent rate was customarily used by the Bureau and was specified in reclamation law. Recently the Treasury had stated that 2.48 was the rate paid for loans over a certain period of years." No man was to make a stronger nor more intelligent fight against the crsp than young Rep. Craig Hosmer from Long Beach, California. An attorney, he had thoroughly briefed himself on reclamation law, on the compacts, and on the laws of the river. He had made a careful study and an analysis of the Bureau reports on the projects. Now given his turn to question the Bureau expert before the committee, he began the unrelenting |