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Show made possible and economically feasible to the coastal cities of southern California. The Metropolitan Water District of Southern California, originally including 13 cities, now includes 28 cities within its borders. It differs from most metropolitan districts in that the con- stituent cities and sub-water district areas need not be contiguous. Each area that associates it- self with the district is represented by one or more directors appointed by the member community in proportion to the assessed valuation and having votes in block also in proportion to assessed valua- tion, except that no city may have more than a 50 percent vote. Other large cities such as New York, Chicago, Detroit, and San Francisco sell substantial quan- tities of water to areas outside their corporate limits and thus are performing some of the serv- ices which are metropolitan in character. The Interstate Commission on the Delaware River, commonly referred to as Incodel, is an interstate agency which until recently functioned in limited fashion under reciprocal State legisla- tion enacted by New York, New Jersey, Pennsyl- vania, and Delaware. A few months ago the Commission released an engineering plan de- signed to provide additions to the available water supply by storage and diversion works on the Upper Delaware watershed. It is claimed that the proposed works will sup- ply water for population increases up to the year 2000, and increase and stabilize the flow of the river, thus limiting the intrusion of salt water which on occasion moves upstream into the Phila- delphia-Camden area. This plan has not as yet been subjected to general public discussion. These examples of the association of communi- ties into metropolitan water districts and, in some instances, adoption of interstate agreements, in- dicate the opportunities of other cities and com- munities to associate themselves into larger dis- trict organizations to procure more adequate and economical water supplies. The Metropolitan Water District of Southern California offers an excellent example of association of widely sepa- rated cities into a metropolitan district for the procurement of water supply from a multiple- purpose Federal river basin development. Federal-State-Local Relations It has been pointed out earlier that the great majority of our cities, towns, and communities are served by municipal water systems. Many of them have taken advantage of enabling legislation providing for metropolitan districts or authorities to work together to obtain needed water supplies more economically than they could have done separately. About 20 percent of the communities are served by private water companies and in some instances such companies have afforded a means of unified water development and inter- connection for a number of communities in a local area. Some States administer water rights and supervise the construction of dams. In gen- eral the operations and rates of privately owned waterworks are subject to a State commission. In some States these commissions establish uniform systems of accounts affecting publicly owned waterworks, and in at least one State (Wisconsin) the commission has jurisdiction over rates charged by the publicly owned waterworks. In many States the State engineer or other authority car- ries on continuing studies of the available water supplies and best coordinated water development in the States. It is in the State boards of health, through their sanitary engineers, however, that there is main- tained the most continuing contact between the State itself and local waterworks. There is, fur- ther, the closest relation between the State boards of health and the United States Public Health Service. The State sanitary engineer and his as- sociates furnish much helpful service, especially to the small waterworks. Through approval powers for all new projects, the State sanitary engineers have raised the standard of small town waterworks construction and operation. The United States Public Health Service carries on extensive research and investigations in improved methods of sanitation which are made available to State boards of health and the more recently created State water pollution control boards. The United States Weather Bureau and the United States Geological Survey carry on con- tinuing investigations and observations. Through their local offices and reports, they furnish valu- 911609-5( -15 183 |
