BOARD01119

• Board Meeting Date: 2/11/1965
• Description: Minutes
• Board Meetings - Doc Type: Meeting

The Governor has advised us. and Mr. Eckles.
the Coordinator of Natural Resources, has ad-
vised us, that some funds can be made available
for the employment of technical people to assist
in the preparation of a comprehensive ground I
water code in the event the Legislature does
not adopt one itself this session. This does
not seem likely.

We are now groping for ideas as to who
should serve on such a committee. It means
that someone must devote a tremendous amount
of time - almost full time - for several months
to get this job done. On our staff, we cannot
accomplish this work ourselves. The Attorney
General's office and the state Engineer's office
have indicated that they will assist in any way
that they can, but it will primarily be an
activity of the Governor's office through Mr.
Eckles. if in fact a code is written.

We have recommended this one piece of
legislation which has been sent to the Board.
It 'Declares that all waters originating or
flowing in this state have always been and
are hereby declared to be the property of the
public, dedicated to the use of the people of
the state. . . .'. This is essentially the
situation which now exists with reference to
surface water and the situation that exists in
most states of the United States.

Mr. Moses prepared a comprehensive brief
on the ground water laws of other western states
which is available in its original form and
which was summarized as a digest and sent aut
to the Board members and many other people.

The staff is also preparing a complete I
set of the codes of most of the states west of
the Mississippi River - a complete set of their
laws. This is a very arduous undertaking and
Mrs. Keating says it will take her six weeks to
type it up. There are several hundred pages
of the actual laws of most of the states west
of the Mississippi. This would then be available