The Yakima herald. [volume] (North Yakima, W.T. [Wash.]) 1889-1914, 1905-12-06
WEDNESDAY, DEC. 6, 1905
WHAT A RECLAMATION PROJECT
MEANS.

compared with agriculture, all Tue
other industries in this state, or in
almost any other state in the Union,
dwindles into insignificance. Farm
property and farm products are the
bases of our business wealth and as
sessed valuation. If the irrigated
area can be increased from IL 900
within the next fifteen years, it
means that the population of the val
ley will be three times as great as 1t
is now, and that the city Of North
Yakima will have 10000 people, in
stead of 5000. The average size Of
each farm will be twenty acres, in
stead of thirty Those who have the
large farms can no longer afford to
hold them. but will sell to the small
farmers who will make a good living
by more intensified farming. By
decreasing the size of the farm, the
rural population will be increased,
making 1t possible and profitable to
build local electric lines, so that the
farmer living twenty miles out can
take his products to town cheaper
than the man who has to maui. and
can go to town after breakfast,
transact his business and get back
before dinner. Every farmer can af-
ford to have a telephone, and have
left near his door within the same
half day, without the loss of an en-
tire day, necessary to hitch up and
go for his supplies with wagon. He
can have better schools, better roads.
better churches. better government,
because there will be more people
in the district in which he lives to
help pay for these things; and he can
have more good neighbors to help Or
ganize better school system. The
increase in school rural population
helps everybody. The old timer,
than anyone else, because it makes
his properly more valuable and puts
helps everyone--the oldtimer more
timers on Puget Sound have all been
made rich by the very rapid increase
in population. When Seattle was
of the size of North Yakima, about
fifteen years ago, only, most of the
farmers were poor. Now there are
many millionaires among them, and
they are most all well to do.
It will help the newcomer, who
will have the. advantage that time
and money spent in the development
of the country, the roads, the tele-
phone and the electric car lines can
give him. He can afford to and will
pay for it. The benefits of govern
ment irrigation have not been eXag-
gerated, and they will surely come if
we can make the conditions possible.
The government must use stored wa
ter to irrigate any new land. and it
must convey this water through the
Yakima and Natchez rivers to the
place where it is to be diverted. To
be sure that none of this stored wa
ter will be wrongly diverted, 1t must
have positive knowledge that the
sum of all the existing water rights
is not more than the natural flow of
the river. To bring this about the
engineers of the reclamation service
no nanuIp Of Nprtl, Vol
sma to ct the owners of water rights
to sign agreements to take only
certain stipulated amount of water,
such as would make the total amount
signed not more than the amount of
water in the river.
About ninety per cent of the wa
ter rights nave been signed for,
more than was actually used. making
$50 cubic feet per second more than
the natural low flow of the river.
There are probably a dozen ditch
~es that are responsible for this con-
dition of affairs. A few of these
have additional lands that can be
irrigated under their existing canals,
for whom there is some excuse; but
for those who have no additional
lands to irrigate, and those who are
allowing water to run to waste, there
is no reasonable excuse for not con-
-fining their claims to the average
amount required.
II the water user should ask, why
should I sacrifice an old right? 1t
might be answered that no one has
asked him to sacrifice any right to