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,.~i?f~ THE MEXICAN WATER TREATY (From Aqueduct, a publication of the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California) A new chapter is being written on the often strained relations between the United States and Mexico over water from the Colorado River. On its way to Congress soon will be a so-called "permanent, defini- tive" solution to Mexico's complaints about the salt content of water delivered in the past 12 years. The dispute has resulted primarily from highly saline irrigation return flow water from the Well ton-Mohawk Irrigation District near Yuma, Arizona. The price tag on the solution: at least $115 million in works to be built by the United States, including the world's largest desalting plant on the Well ton-Mohawk drain at a cost of $67 million. "It was a political settlement on the part of former U. S, Attorney General Herbert Brownell, said Ray Rummonds, chairman of the Colorado River Board of California. "He had to work amid conflicting interests of the United States and Mexico as well as those of the water-short seven Colorado River Basin States..' Brownell was appointed by President Nixon, with the rank of ambas- sador, to study the salinity problems and corne up with a settlement. Mexico, under a new interpretation of the 1944 treaty with the United States, will be provided water that is very comparable in quality to that being diverted for irrigation in Imperial Valley in Southern California. Specifically, it is to be only 115 parts per million higher in salt content than that at Imperial Darn. It's currently 850 ppm at Imperial Darn, the last major diversion point on this side of the border. "Congress will now have to authorize the works and appropriate the necessary funds on a timely basis to carry out the settlement in good faith," Rummonds said. .' It is clearly a national obligation - one which should be borne at federal expense without adverse impact on water and power users of the seven states." At a press conference at the Western White House in San Clemente, Brownell announced the signing of both countries of a new agreement specifying the quality of 1.5 million acre-feet annually that must be delivered under the treaty, which is administered by the International Water and Boundary Commission. ,. It was part of the treaty after construction of Hoover Darn that Mexico would take water that included irrigation return flow, , Rummonds said.