Imperial Valley press., 1919-09-05
DRAINAGE IS
PROBLEM Of
TODAY SAYS
Mr.. CH|LDERS

That concerted action on the part
of public bodies in Imperial County
will save from water-logging thous-
ands of acres of valuable land and
make valuable thousands of acres of
worthless land is the opinion of Chas.
L. Childers, attorney for Imperial Wa
ter Co. No. 7, who has given much
time and thought to the county's
drainage problems.
Mr.. Childers points out that the
pocket veto Of the governor of a bill
which was sponsored by the univer-
sity of California experts leaves the
state without adequate legislation to
meet the drainage problem and that to
save losses from the extension OF the
water-logged area there should be
action prior to the next Legislature
session. He does not indicate the ex-
act line action feeling that matter
act line of action feeling that q matter
by leaders in valley activities.
His general summary of conditions
follows:
"There are thousands of acres at
the present time in Imperial Valley
ruined by water logging, and per-
haps the average would extend to at
least twenty-five thousand To this
each year is being added an enormous
acreage. There is very little Of the
valley that is not underlaid with
water table that is getting near the
surface. These facts were brought
out by very careful and recent IN
vestigation conducted by the Univer-
sity of California.
'The question of drainage is a very
serious problem because of the ma
chinery that we have to deal with; the
physical aspect is not hard at all. The
engineers have made careful investi-
cation and have determined that the
water can easily be carried in pro-
perly constructed drainage canals to
the various natural channels and car
nv it away to the Salton Sea. This will
not only protect against rising water
table, but thousands of acres of land
which have always been considered
worthless can be reclaimed. The ques-
ton is having a proper political organ
izaticn to handle the situation.
"At the present time there are
three drainage acts on our Statute
Books, none of which apply properly
to our conditions. The one under
which most of the drainage projects IN
other places in California have been
formed has recently been repealed and
a new act which is very little better
has been substituted in it's place. One
of the other three acts is cumbersome
piece of machienry that would require
an organization as extensive as the
present irrigation district, with ap-
proximately the same sort of officers
and systems of raising revenue.
at is highly desirable that no new
organizations be formed to do this
work because we are already organiz-
ed to death The irrigation district,
however, is hardly in a position to
handle it because they must levy taxes
to do the work and this tax will have
to be equal. In other words, they will
have to tax a piece Of land which re-
quires no drainage to reclaim some
one elss's land, at a very great eX-
pense, which is inequitable.
"The same thing is true of the mu-
tual water companies. They must
assess their stock to raise funds. The
stock will have to be assessed equally
with the same situation we have in
the case of the irrigation district. At
the last session Of the legislature a
i bill was introduced and sponsored by
the University which wAlld very ma
terially have helped the situation, but
for some reason not known to me, it
was killed by pocket veto by the gov
ernor.
"It seems necessary that we clothe
the irrigation district or the mutual
water companies with power to do this
work and do it by assessing damages
and benefits to each individual piece
of land. The difficulty with that is that
we will have to wait two years before
we can move and in that time it means
millions of dollars lost to the valley"
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