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<br />0n253)6 <br /> <br />From the Central Arizon& Project Association <br />510 Goodrich Building <br />Phoenix. Arizona <br /> <br />~'\ <br /> <br />FOR Ili.".EDIATE RELEASE <br /> <br />PHOENIX. Mar. 00 -- Awareness of the threat California poses to every other <br />state in the Colorado River Basin is snowballing throughout the basin. David F~ . <br />Brinegar. executive secretary of the Central Arizona Project Association. said t?- <br />day. <br /> <br />Brinegar's comment was based on an article on the editorial page of the <br />Denver Post of ~arch 13. written by Roscoe Fleming, featured columnist of the Post <br />and writer for other publications across the nation. <br /> <br />Fleming charged that the "massive. solid. selfishly cold and efficient grab- <br />it-all policy of the Californians. buttressed by enonnous supplies of money" <br />threatens the v,hole Colorado River Basin outside California." <br /> <br />Brinegar said Mr. Fleming's article added to expressions by Gov. Howard Pyle <br />of Arizona. Gov. Dan Thornton of Colorado, Gov. J. Bracken Lee of Utah. by Gus p. <br />Baekman, manager of the Salt Lake City Chamber of Comrrerce. and by the editors of <br />the "yorning State Tribune at Cheyenne, the Yuma Sun at Yuma. the Arizona Republic <br />and the Phoenix Gazette at Phoenix. the Arizona Daily Star at Tucson. and others <br />"too numerous to mention". all warning of the dangers of California's avarice. <br /> <br />Brinegar quoted Fleming as saying in part: (quoted by permission) <br /> <br />"Well. the Californians have throvm off all pretense of being just 'friends <br />of .onserva~ion' x x x <br /> <br />"Only the blind have ever been fooled by the Californians' pretense that <br />they care anything at all about conservation in Colorado, a thousand miles away <br />from them. For California's o~n history is one long record of unbridled looting <br />of natural resources---including the nation's within its borders---for the private <br />profit of its powerful. <br /> <br />"Everything they've done for 50 years is explained only by the thesis that <br />they confidently expect to get virtually the entire flow of the Colorado River. <br /> <br />"Reeent dispatches from Los Angeles say, for example, that the megapolis <br />feels its future is assured. beoause Southern California is as yet using only about <br />15 percent of the capacity of the works built to siphon the Colorado River into <br />Southern California though it is using more than one-third of the river's flow. <br /> <br />"Southern Californians are even getting choosy. and say they won't accept <br />Upper Basin water if it is too salty. <br /> <br />"So the role in whioh they have cast our region. where the river rises, is <br />to serve as the drab cocoon out of vhich will spring the glorious butterfly of full- <br />fledged Southern California civilization. Of course, a coooon has no future, save: <br />to dry up and blow away." <br /> <br />Brinegar then said Fleming called California "the menace to everyone else in <br />the West." <br /> <br />"The power of California," Brinegar concluded. "can be offset if all the <br />other states in the Colorado River Basin un~te. In fact, unity of the Colorado <br />River Basin outside of California might lead to unity of the 16 Western reclamation <br />states other than California, and the roadblock in Congress to Federal reclamation <br />starts might be . removed. " <br /> <br />-0- <br />