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SUMMARY This report is submitted pursuant to Public Law (P,L,) 104-20 of July 28, 1995, an act to amend the Colorado River Basin Salinity Control Act (Act) of 1974, This amendment requires the Secretary of the Interior to submit a planning report to the appropriate committees of Congress concerning the new, basinwide approach to salinity control established by section 202(a)(6) of the Act, The Bureau of Reclamation (Reclamation) is committed to pursuing efficient new methods of controlling salinity, In a review of the Colorado River Basin Salinity Control Program (Audit Report No. 93.1-810 dated March 1993), the Inspector General found that the unit.specific authorities provided by earlier legislation (P.L, 93.320 and P,L, 98-569) limited the opportunities for Reclamation to implement cost-effective salinity control. The Inspector General recommended Reclamation seek legislation to broaden its authorities to allow more alternatives to be added to the mix of projects eligible for implementation, Reclamation accepted the recommendation and thoroughly reevaluated its role in the salinity control program in 1994, Later in 1994, ReclamatioI). and the Colorado River Basin States (Wyoming, Utah, Colorado, California, Nevada, New Mexico, Arizona) developed legislation to implement the Inspector General's recom. mendations, This legislation was enacted and signed into law on July 28, 1995, Pursuant to P,L, 104-20, this report summarizes Reclamation's plans for implementing its new basinwide salinity control program, As an alternative to adopting new regulations, Reclamation plans to administer the program through existing procurement techniques and established regulations, Reclamation will solicit proposals and award funding through a "Request for Proposals" (RFP) process, An example RFP is attached to this report, Essentially, the RFP would request proposals from the public and private sector that would control salinity, The proposals would be ranked, based on their cost to prevent salt from entering the river system, The ranking would also consider risk factors that might affect the project's performance, Cost effectiveness will be computed on a cost-per-ton basis and include all potential costs to the program, Risk factors will evaluate performance risks to the program and be used to adjust the ranking of projects. The proposals will be ranked by a ranking committee, Members of the committee will be selected to avoid any conflict of interest that would bias their choices, The ranking committee members will individually and OCC183