The Salt Lake tribune. [volume] (Salt Lake City, Utah) 1890-current, 1910-08-07
SHAKING AMONG
THE LAND BOARD
Continued from Page One.

lHE LAND bUARU
Continued from Page One.
stituted. In this project S,266.74 acres
are segregated. Other Carey land prof.
ectS are;
Oasis Land and Irrigation company,
43 1888 acres segregated.
T.. Warren Stees, account of II, w.
Shelley of Salt Lake City, 1859 l5 acres
| segregated.
Buckhorn Irrigation company, 90
S39,S7 acres segregated,
Secretary Lynch Breaks Loose.
That the state board of land commits
sioners knows that it has ignored the
laws and its own rules is dlscerned by
tho interview given by Secretary Will
liam j, Lynch Of the board to the Des-
eret News Saturday. In this interview
Secretary Lynch takes up tho matter
of the Oasis project in Millard county.
In this interview Mr.. Lynch is quoted
as saying:
Members Of the company are now In
the east. and have practically closed a
contract with company which will un-
derwrlte q bond Issue Of S125,OOO to take
up the floating Indebtedness Of the COM
pany and complete the Oasis Carey act
project. provided certain concessions VIII
be given By the DeSeret Irrigation COM
pany and the Melville Irrigation com
pany, both of which are Interested
Now the facts are that no contract
has been closed for underwriting. This
would mean a second mortgage on the
property. In this connection it might
be said that so water contracts of the
Oasis company sent TO the recorder OF
MIlard county for record are retained
by the recorder because the fees for
recording, which amount to about $340,
are not paid and the recorder has there
fore declined TO return them to the
company which has made the request,
until these fees arc paid. 1t is said
that the company wants the contracts
on account of subsequent payments be-
ing due,
secretary's Memory Short.
Mr.. Lynch in his interview says that
the farmers realize that even if the
Oasis company had been bonded for
Sl,O00,000 it could not have withstood
the violent floods of this spring which
tore out railroads as well as dams, -
The secretary must have n short mem
ory, for on July 7 and s, there was
hearing before the state land board
of the Oasis case. He was present and
administered the oath to the witnesses.
One Of those witnesses, Col. Moore, tes-
titled as to the construction Of the
Melville dam. which was washed out,
rested upon Quicksand and the I'M
pounded water worked underneath this
spillway through the quicksand and
caused the cement work to drop into
the excavation made for the dam. There
was no flood. The impounded waters
caused 1t.
This was also admitted on the wit
ness stand by Professor Lyman, engi-
neer for the Oasis people, in charge of
the construction of the dam Again
Secretary Lynch says:
Says There Is Another Side.
That there are two sides to the story
is apparent from the fact that the state
land board received on July 10 letter
from settlers IN Burtner, Milard county,
which vindiCatcs TO some extent the COM
pany and impuencd the integrity Of the
compainants, The letter. dated Burtner.
July II. and signed by Charles o. Con-
nelly, Albert Watts. Loren Taylor and
j. J. Clark, reads In part. as follows
Having. cause to believe that the
course being pursued by certain other
owners OF water rights purchased from
the Oasis Land & Irrigation company
may be injurious to our interests, we
wish 10 advise you that the parties above
referred to, having other means OF main
tcnance or homes elsewhere. and whose
holdings here are largely speculative. are
seemingly Intent upon the destruction of
the Oasis Land 81 Irrigation company,
which. IN our opinion, would he discs
S,r,he,. waior,cnh ~ Tbn nriIa ,.tii u',%! rc
fcrred 10 we believe to be minority of
the actual settlers"
Contracts Were Approved
Now the fact is that the owners of
the water rights have had their con.
tracts approved by the state board OF
land commissioners. therefore the board
is not in position to say that the set
tiers are not qualified settlers, Sccre
tary Lynch. as SAID. must have Il short
memory. Again Mr.. Lynch says:
The state engineer approved the plans
and specifications OF the Oasis dam. and
the whole project would probably have
been accepted and the matter turned over
to the company If the Hoods had not
be all right 10 tho state engineer,
The testimony of Colonel Moore and
Engineer Lyman disproVes this state.
ment of Secretary Lynch
IN connection with the matter of the
bond which the Carey act required
should be given by the Oasis Land
company, the Oasis company stated TO
the board that the company could not
give the bond which the law required
the company TO give. because il was not
financially in position 10 do so, Yet in
the face of This statement. the board
did nothing toward making the COM
pany comply with the law.
About Rulo Nineteen.
As TO rule 10, A. M Trader. secretary
of the Oasis Land & Irrigation com. /
pany, testified on the witness stand be |
fore the land board heretofore cited,
that the money received by the Oasis |
company in payment of water contracts |
of the settlers had not been deposited |
with the state land board but had been |
used by the company in the promotion |
OF its project
At the same hearing Mr.. Copcning, |
the selling agent for the Oasis company, |
testified thai he represented to pur-
chGscrs of land under the Oasis pro