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<br />to the acreage rule. (Landowners owning one acre or more of irrigated land <br />within the District are entitled to one vote for each acre owned.) <br /> <br />OMID attorney Bill Frey, next advised the 30 or so landowners in attendance at <br />the 1996 meeting that he had consulted with the Colorado Attornev General and <br />they had Uointly) concluded that OMID was private in nature and not subiect to <br />Tabor. Therefore, OMID board had, by previous resolution, made a voting <br />change for the MML loan request from CWCB. Regardless of the voting proce- <br />dures used to elect directors, all water user were entitled to one vote. (Joint <br />owners are entitled to one vote.) Frey didn't cite the rule of law of which he and <br />the Attorney General used to authorize the voting change resolution. Nor did he <br />name the person in the office of the Attorney General with which he had con- <br />sulted before allowing the board to change voting procedures by resolution. <br /> <br />This voting procedure change Frey approved varies from Tabor in that under <br />Amendment 1 each registered voter is entitled to one vote. For example. a cou- <br />ple living on a quarter of an acre in one side of a rented duplex, register to vote <br />in general elections and served by OMID, would be entitled to one vote each. <br /> <br />Without bringing the feasibility study off the table for landowners approval, the <br />vote to authorize OMID to seek a CWCS loan passed by a vote of about 225 to <br />15. <br /> <br />Comment: OMID did not provide copies of the proxies used to compile this <br />vote as a part of discovery for case 3 97-CV-526. OMID has not recorded this <br />vote with the Mesa County Clerk and Recorder. CWCB attorney Linda Bassi ad- <br />vised landownersthat CWCB has provided plaintiffs all associated MML records. <br />These proxies were not included in these documents. <br /> <br />Duane L. Johnson, State Conservationist, NRCS, advised landowners in a letter <br />dated April 19, 1996 that the United States would not issue OMID the $400,000 <br />salinity control grant until the entire 21,500 feet of MML had been converted to <br />closed pipe. Additionally, he wrote in this letter that there were six Grand Junc- <br />tion District NRCS employees among the 30 thirty in attendance at the 1996 an- <br />nual meeting. Of these six, three lived within the District, and were on vacation <br />to attend. Mr. Johnson has refused to provide copies of time sheets for the six. <br />It can not be determined if any of these federal employees voted at that meeting. <br /> <br />At a special OMID meeting, held May 6, 1996, board member Melvin Rettig <br />made a motion to have Westwater Engineering prepare a feasibility study for <br />MML. This study was completed September 20, 1996, a year and one half after it <br />was tabled. <br /> <br />Applicants for CWCB loans are required to submit a feasibility study before the <br />loan application is submitted to the Colorado General Assembly and the gover- <br /> <br />6 <br /> <br />~ <br />~. <br />