The San Francisco call., 1909-06-13
MANY WATERPOWER
SITES WITHDRAWN
Geological Survey Acts Upon
the Order of Secretary
of the Interior
Government Carrying Out It's
Policy of Protecting the
Public interests
Especial Dsrqtch 10 The Call

Especial DSrdtch TO he Call
WASHINGTON. June 12.-Acting upon
the specific instructions Of the secre-
tary of the interior the United States
geological survey has begun the in
vestigation of water power sites on the
public lands Since April %. the date
of the secretary's order. the director
of the survey has recommended IL
temporal Withdrawals lin aid of pro-
posed legislation affecting the disposal
of the water power sites on the public
domain" These power site with
drawaIs, aggregating 296.365 acres of
public lands in the states of Utah,
Colorado. wyoming, Montana, Idaho
and Oregon, have been approved by
Secretary BaIlinger. The present pol
icy is to protect the public interests on
the one hand by promptly. withdrawing
from all entry all public lands con-
tanning possible power sites, and on
the other hand by excluding from such
withdrawals. as far as information at
hand warrants. all areas of no value
for power purposes but properly dis
posabIe under the agricultural and
other public land laws.
The director of the geological survey
has assured the secretary that the
temporary Withdrawals of water power
sites already made from data in the
possession of the survey, together with
such as will hereafter be made prior
to the conv ening of congress, will be
ample to protect all the more important
water power sites undisposed OF on
the public domain and enable congress
to intelligently legislate for their dis
position Field plans provide for spe-
cial investigation of Withdrawals
already made and for surveys along
certain western rivers where further
information OF more exact data are de-
sirable in addition to the continuation
of the regular river flow observations,
| for all of which work the current
appropriations provide.
POWER SITE WITHDRAWALS
Five of the Il Withdrawals already
made include all the power sites avail
able in the areas that were withdrawn
by Secretary Garfield and restored 10
entry by Secretary BalHnger last
month. The present Withdrawals, how
ever, comprise much smaller acreage,
one-sixth or less OF the areas of the
y
This reduction has been made possible
in part by omission of lands patented
or reserved prior to the original with
drawals, but more largely by the ex-
clusion of land in no wise essential
| or useful TO power development
| The vacated Withdrawals included
| large areas of public land of possible
! a gricultural or mineral value at such
distances from the rivers as TO have
absolutely no connection with the
/ future development of the water re-
sources. On the other hand. the re-
vised Withdrawals in the same regions
/ in some cases cover power sites missed
/ by the earlier action. Thus in the case
i of the Salmon river in Idaho. where
i the original withdrawal totaled 322. $50
! acres, that based upon the recent rec
ommendation of the geological survey
/ includes ZOO acres. A similar reduc-
4 tion holds for the Owyhee river in
oregon, and in even greater measure
for the FIathead and the Missouri and
| tributaries in Montana.
BASED ON OFFICIAL DATA
All the recommendations by the geo
! logical survey have been based upon
official data already on file. The stream
/ flow records collected by the water
resources branch of the survey and by
the reclamation service constitute prac-
ticany all the photographic infOrma-
tion available for the public land
states, stations on all the important
streams in these states having been
maintained for a series of years for
/ the purposes of determining the water
| available for irrigation The tOpO-
graphic surveys which have been con-
Quoted by the geological survey for 80
wears also furnish means of selecting
without delay the sections Of the rivers
important for power purposes.