Arizona republican., 1910-06-09
SETTLERS
 ARE HOPEFUL Of Getting Into Reclamation
 Zone PLAYS BEING PREPARED
To Show That Lands Are Susceptible of Irrigation It Only Remains to Be Shown Whether There Will Be Enough Water.

As a result of a petition liberally signed and presented to the board of governors and members of the council of the Water Users Association by Attorney Dougherty of this place. the land owners between the Highland canal and the New Eastern canal have received information which it is cal Culated will place them in more hopeful frame of. mind if not enthuSi
 astic The object of the petition, as
 has been stated before in these col umns, was for the purpose of including
 that portion of land lying between the old Highland and the new Eastern
 canals within the boundaries of the
 Water Users Association, amounting
 to approximately 210O acres. It de
 veloped that the board of governors do not have the pswer to change the
 boundaries of the association but the council has the power of recommend ing that the boundaries be changed but the actual change of boundaries must be made by d vote of the stockholders of the association. However. the real information which is calculated will be the more welcome is that at the
 present time there is a corps of en-
 gineers working out a system of plats shoV.ing the lands susceptible of irri- gation and which will be submitted to the secretary of the interior. It is pretty generally understood that it is the intention to include the lands be
 tween the two canals in these plats and that in the event that there is d sufficient rainfall this summer to fill the reservoir or to nearly fill it that the new lands between the two canals will stand a good chance of being irri- gated from the stored water. It is un- derstood that the plats will he for warded to the secretary some time the latter part of August.
 number of petitions have been filed from different portions of the valley asking that lands be admitted within the boundaries of the Water Users Association but in every in stance these prayers have been laid over until the completion of the farm plats. As a matter of fact the real fortune either good or bad depends en- tirely upon the rainfall this coming summer 1t is believed that practically all lands on the south side under the canals will be watered if the reservoir is filled, the only discrepancy being in the event that there is a shortage of summer rains and then correspond ing acreage to the acre feet of water in the reservoir would be irrigated.
 The land owners to the south of the base line and outside of the Eastern canal and inside a line drawn along the contour line giving another canal ample fall if taken out on the eastern side of the Eastern canal, are of the opinion that they have received enough assurance that they will receive re- servoir water in the event that there is any to make them feel jubilant. These lands are without the reclamation zone 'Or at least a part of them are since their entries have been made subject to communication. It is not the object of this article to leave the impression that the reclamation officials have given out any information to the eff feet that lateral will be taken out on the eastern side of the Eastern canal It is presumed that such a move would be undertaken slowly and certainly not until the government had had am pie assurance by actual demonstration that the reservoir was more than suf- ficient to accommodate the lands al ready subject to irrigation under the present canal systems.