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~~~i I ' 1 . -71- The records of the Prewitt Qperating Committee show the acre-feet which can be delivered at the Prewitt Reservoir outlet for each share in the Morgan-Prewitt Reservoir Company, rather than the amount which can be delivered to the ditch lateral. The shrink from the outlet of Prewitt Reservoir to each ditch is calculated separately for each release of water, depending on the circumstances, such as river flow, etc. This is done by the Water Commissioner, who notifies the Prewitt Qperating Committee. The water commissioners tell the Prewitt Qperating Committee how much water must be delivered each day to the river from Prewitt Reservoir in exchange for water delivered to ditches up- stream in Water District No.1, by reason of ownership of Morgan- Prewitt R' servoir Company "river exchange" shares. Since we had information that farmers under the Weldon Valley Ditch had leased some Morgan-Prewitt shares in 1966, and had run them in their ditch, we reviewed the 1966 records. The records showed no releases of Prewitt Reservoir water, for exchange, to the Weldon Valley Ditch in 1966. This may be accounted for if the shares leased were charged instead on the Prewitt QperatingCom- m~ttee books to the lessors' ditches. There is no way, however, to determine this, and this is one of the serious defects in the "water bookkeeping" by the various companies and districts in the valley. It means that only the Water Commissioner actually knows what is going on, and opens the doors to possible mis- handling of the leased water rights with no way to ascertain from the records that such mishandling has occurred. The same situa- tion exists on the books of the Jackson Lake Reservoir Company and other companies. ~ .. . ~ . WOOOWAR"O.CLYOE.SHERARD AND ASSOCIATES