BOARD01799

• Board Meeting Date: 9/8/1961
• Description: Minutes and Resolution
• Board Meetings - Doc Type: Meeting

The four states of this Upper Basin are provid-
ing funds in the sum of $100,000 per year to
maintain a qualified and competent technical
staff for the sole purpose of advising the Com-
mission on these technical matters. Colorado
furnishes $51,750.00 per year of that amount. I
This staff, to date, has been entirely ignored
by the Commission members on this very important
issue.

I also informed the Commission that the
Governor of our state had never been informed
or consulted pertaining to the proffered reso-
lution nor had our Board been previously informed
of such resolution. It was already a well known
fact that Governor McNichols was off to wyoming
on the one-shot antelope hunt. I also advised
the Commission that if it adopted the 'proffered
resolution then there would be a serious ques-
tion as to whether or not the state of Colorado
could support its activities in the future.

Following my remarks, Governor Johnson then
launched an attack upon the Colorado Water Con-
servation Board. He stated that the Board
didn't know what it was doing; had no business
making a recommendation; that the resolution
of August 2, 1961 was 'railroaded' through.

From my very hasty reading of the Commis-
sion resolution it became apparent that the
private power companies had made some sort of
secret agreement with certain members of the
Upper Colorado River Commission. This became
obvious when Commissioner Johnson stated that
unless the Commission adopted the proposed
resolution then the undisclosed and unseen
offer of the private power companies would be
withdrawn.

I

After my plea, the New Mexico commissioner
began proposinS a series of amendments to the
resolution. The effect of the New Mexico
amendments were to water down considerably the
resolution originally presented. These amend-
ments were consistently objected to by Governor