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<br />002S31 <br /> <br />~ <br /> <br />.[~ <br /> <br />- 13 - <br /> <br />. <br /> <br />outside the jurisdiction undertaking a project share the benefits, direct <br />grants may be desirable. Under other circumstances, loans repayable from <br />user charges or through assessment of beneficiaries may be used. <br /> <br />It may be found that direct state construction (or cooperation <br />with federal agencies in the construction) of some projects is desirable. <br />This, for example, may be true of the development of large water supply <br />reservoirs and transmission facilities to deliver water to local agencies. <br />It may be most feasible for a state agency to act as sponsor for a water <br />project eligible for federal aid or to contract for storage space in <br />federal reservoirs and provide transmission facilities to localities. <br /> <br />Pollution Control <br /> <br />Water quantity is closely related to water quality. As the de- <br />.mands for water increase, one of the important ways of augmenting <br />effective supply is to maintain the quality at a high enough level to <br />meet the requirements for desired use. Entirely aside from the recent <br />pressures on supply, there is a continuing public health problem since <br />pollution can become high enough to constitute a serious threat to the <br />health and welfare of the connnunity. Furthermore, the factors that have <br />contributed to the general water demand picture have also helped to pro- <br />duce a pollution problem. Concentrations of population and industries <br />have materially increased the concentrations of polluting wastes in some <br />areas. <br /> <br />As recently as 1953, it could be reported in one of the co- <br />operative state-federal reports on water pollution that only five Missouri <br />Basin states had legislation relating pollution to all legitimate water <br />uses; that, in three, only pollution influencing public health was sub- <br />ject to abatement proceedings; and that, in two, there were virtually no <br />legislative provisions for control and abatement of pollution. At the <br />present time, the situation in relation to legislative authorization is <br />considerably changed. Eight states have broad, basic legislation pro- <br />viding for a fairly comprehensive program of pollution control and <br />abatement. The 1953 report indicated that no water pollution control <br />agency in the Basin had statutory authority for the development of a <br />comprehensive program for the control and abatement of water pollution. <br />Recent legislation has specifically given this authority in at least <br />half of the states. It might seem that these recent developments, coupled <br />with the improvements in administrative organization outlined previously, <br />would remove water pollution control from a list of major future problems. <br /> <br />As a matter of fact, much remains to be done. Approximately a <br />fourth of the municipalities with sewers in the Basin have no treatment <br />facilities for sewage. Another fourth provide only primary treatment, <br />which reduces waste by only one-fourth--a fairly low efficiency even for <br />primary treatment facilities. The total waste reduction by treatment for <br />the Basin is about 25 per cent. For individual states, discharge of un- <br />treated sewage into streams varies from a high of 80 per cent of the total <br />discharge to a low of less than 1 per cent. Waste removal by treatment is <br />approximately 14 per cent of the total waste produced in one state and 67 <br />per cent in the state with the best treatment. Figures for all Basin <br />states are shown in Appendix D. Owing to the inadequacy of available <br />