OCR Text |
Show THE IDES OF MARCH 111 Pennsylvania, Pillion of New York, Hosmer of Cali- fornia, Haley of Florida, Gwinn of New York, Gross of Iowa, Devereaux of Maryland, Davis of Wisconsin, Allen of Illinois, Brown of Ohio, and a number of others. The crsp plan violated existing statutes in many way, both small and large. For example: 1 - Reclamation law specified that construction costs for irrigation shall be repaid in forty years in forty annual installments after a project is completed. A de- velopment period of ten years was permitted. In the crsp plan, a substantial part of these repayments was postponed for forty to sixty years after a project was in use. It was an old trick of the Bureau, also, not to an- nounce officially that a project was completed. 2 - In the crsp plan the Bureau used the Collbran Formula. Congress had specifically declared that this formula was applied only to the little Collbran Project in Colorado and was not a precedent for future projects. 3 - There is no authority in reclamation law for finding a project feasible under a so-called benefit-cost ratio. The law required that feasibility shall be de- termined by a finding that reimbursable costs could be repaid within the period prescribed. 4 - Reclamation law specified that an interest rate of three per cent shall be used in determining power rates. The crsp plan used an interest rate of 2V2%. 5 - Reclamation law specified that power develop- ment was incidental to irrigation projects, but the crsp was first a power project, and irrigation projects were entirely dependent upon the revenues from power. Rep. Saylor, a Republican, reflected the feelings of many congressmen in a stiff letter to Budget Director Dodge: 132 |