BOARD01415

• Board Meeting Date: 11/1/1978
• Description: Agenda, Minutes, Resolution
• Board Meetings - Doc Type: Meeting

in the congress. There are parts of the water policy which are good
but which are not new. The emphasis on conservation and things of that
nature is not original with this administration.

One of the critical parts of the President's water policy had to do
with funding. The President has proposed that the states involved in
the federal projects must come up with a 10 percent cash contribution I
for each of the projects. This is based on a varying formula. The
cash contribution would be for only that portion of the project which
earns revenues or what we normally call "for the reimbursable ".costs of
the project." There is already state participation in the wild life.
and recreational features up to 50 percent of the cost. That proposal
is meeting with considerable resistance in Congress.

so far, the President has not proposed a single act to implement his.
water policy. Most of the things that he is trying to do will require
congressional action.

To date. we have seen no proposals by the Administration for legislation
to implement the proposed policy. However, the President says he will
apply his own criteria regardless of what Congress does. So even though
Congress rejects his water policy. he states that, he will implement it
anyway. That remains to be seen.

The Board will recall the confusion and the actions relating to the
Public Works Appropriations Bill this year. The President, at the very
last minute, after the hearings had been close~ and the committees. for
the House and Senate were in markup, started a blitzkrieg to defeat a-_
number of projects in that bill. Congress ignored his request and enacted
a public works bill, which the President did veto. Congress was unable
to override the veto.

I think it would have been easily overridemiin the senate, but it never
got to the Senate. Since the bill originated in the House, the House
took it up first on the veto override.

A majority of the Congressmen did vote to override the veto, but they
lacked the two-thirds majority required for override.

I sent out to the Board a couple of weeks ago a summary of how the
western congressmen voted. You will note that we had many states who
voted 100 percent for override. Others did not. We were deserted
entirely by New Mexico in the Upper Basin.

Several other governors of western states, as a result of arm twisting I
by the White House, indicated they would not support the veto override;
namely, the Governors of Idaho, New Mexico, and Nevada, as well as the
GOvernor of Nebraska.

In mOst cases, the Congressmen ignored their governors. In Idaho, for
instance, they voted 100 percent for the override, and Nebraska, as I
recall, also 100 percent for override. There were a lot of rumors
around Washington that those governors were promised federal appoint-
ments. That may be only a rumor, but it will be interesting to see

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