The Waterbury Democrat., 1941-11-25

ion appropriation
 EdsOn for starting con- stTuction on 8 couple of hydro electric dams and generating sta- tons in the Tennessee Valley Au- thority country,
 AS the people In the southeastern states know from personal exper- fence and ns the people In the rest of the country have read in their newspapers, there is really serious power shortage down southeast. 1t isn't mythical scare like the Ickes petroleum shortage, but Q genuine blackout. It hits defense industries such as nitrate, phosphate, ord- nance, aluminium and aircraft plants that use electric power, and for that reason the pressure Is on to get something done to relieve the short- age.
 SIX WEEKS LOST
 BEFORE HEARINGS
 In mld-August, IVA acquired from private interests the much. fought-over Fontana daInsite on the Little Tennessee river. Congress was asked to appropriate eiS mil- lion to start construction. At the same time, 9iB million was request ed to start the Douglas dam on branch of the Tennessee, known as the French Broad river. The Doug las dam was proposed because 1t could be built almost as . duplicate of the Cheroke dam, already under construction on another branch of the Tennessee, the Holston. Equip ment and labor crews could be moved from Cherokee to repeat the work at Douglas. Because of this, 1t was estimated the Douglas dam could he built in 16 months.
 On October l, the House of Rep- res0ntatives subcommittee on na- tlonal defense deficiency appropriR- tions got around to holding hearings. Six weeks had been lost already, and If that isn't bottleheck, what is7 The grief is that it's still bottle- necked, after more than three months, and there Is no telling when 1t will all be cleared.
 What happened was that the pro- ject fell afoul of on old-fashioned congressional log jam. Special Inter. estS were involved, and they have been successful in blocking the ron- tana and Douglas projects. The special interests happen to be three canning factories which would be put out of business if the Douglas dam were built. The battle seems to be that to preserve "canning as usual" the dam and the electric power 1t might produce quickly wiD have to be sacrificed.
 The French Broad river admitted ly Is one of the most fertile of the upper Tennessee valley tributaries. On the French Broad low-lands farmers have been raising peas and beans which they sold to the three canning factories. If the Douglas dam were built, these lands -- some 5000 acres of Glass I soil would naturally be flooded, the farmers would have to be resettled, the can- ming factories would go out of bus iness. Because of these objections, the Douglas dam was not recon. mended before, but under the urg- ency of increasing the power supply the Douglas project was finally brought out by IVA and given Q big push.
 McKELLER TO
 THE RESCUE
 Almost immediately, 1t bumped into Senator Kenneth Mcclellan of Memphis. He became the champion of the three canning factories and the farmers. No question of damages was involved. The government stood ready to buy the lands and the can- ming factories at fair value, and help resettie the farmers elsewhere as IVA had done before at Norris and other damsites. It was just that the canenries and some of the farmers didn't want to move.
 To lick the Douglas project, still stalled in the House Appropriations Committee, McKellar tried, as the second lease-lend appropriation bill was going through the Senate, to tack on an amendment authorizing construction of two other dams, one on the Holston river near Bristol, the other on the Watauga river near Elizabethton.
 The Senate Appropriations Com- mittee killed the amendments, but now McKellar has an idea to build a couple of other dams on the Cum berland river, one at Carthage, the other at Salina, If the Douglas dam project is approved by the House, Senator McKeilar will propose his substitutes.
 IVA says all these substitutes will take longer to build and won't pro- duce equivalent power. McKellar in- inmates that David E. Lillienthal. IVA director, is just being stub- born and is hold up defense by refusing to see anything but the Douglas damsite. Anyway, the mat ter is stalled, and the much-needed increase in IVA hydro-electric pow CT is getting no place while the bat tie in the bottleneck goes on.
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