BOARD01119

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

I

the Rio Grande compact meeting. I used to
attend those meetings, but after several meet-
ings at which New Mexico and Texas accosted us
as to why certain water was not delivered, all
I could do was to try to look innocent and
change the subject. So I quit going because
Mr. ~fuitten, Mr. Geissinger, Mr. Gildersleeve,
and Mr. Moses can look more innocent than I
can:

I would like to briefly answer Mr. McCand-
less and Mr. Goodwin who raised some questions
about the Savery-pot Hook and Fruitland Mesa
Projects in connection with land acreage limita-
tion. This matter, as you know, was quite
thoroughly discussed before the Congressional
committees. There was no reluctance on the part
of the Congress to actually give us special
legislation which would increase the acreage.
And this it did. Congress gave the Secretary
of the Interior the authority to increase the
acreage to an economic farm unit. The only
question that the Congress wants to know now is
what the Bureau considers to be an economic farm
unit. If that's 300 acres the Congress will go
along with it, or whatever it is. But that's
the question they have directed to the Bureau -
what is considered to be an economic farm unit?

I

It was reported, in a Washington dispatch
on the Savery-pot Hook and Fruitland Mesa, that
it was disappointing because no construction
funds were requested for these two projects.
This is not exactly correct. It was not antici-
pated that any construction funds as such would
be appropriated this year. It will take at least
a year or two years of advance planning before"
construction can start. So no amount of money, I
don't believe, could get the projects under
construction during the coming fiscal year.
Bostwick Park is a much simpler project to con-
struct and for that reason it can be placed under
early construction, perhaps by the end of the
fiscal year. The money which was recommended in
the president's budget was that amount of money
which was already programed as a start on these