The CHAIRMAN. You need an additional appropriation now to get that money? Colonel WEST. That is right, sir. The CHAIRMAN. Representative O'Neal, representing the Louisville district, has been in contact with the committee, and I will say to the other members of the committee that, he is very greatly interested. Is Mr. Rockwell here representing the Civilian Production Administration in the Big Sandy region? Are Mr. Dillon and Mr. Warner here? Mr. DILLON. Yes, sir. The CHAIRMAN. As I understand you, gentlemen, you are interested in the Scioto-Sandusky projects, are you? Mr. DILLON. That is right, Mr. Chairman. SCIOTO-SANDUSKY RIVER SYSTEM STATEMENT OF E. W. DILLON, ATTORNEY FOR SCIOTO-SANDUSKY CONSERVANCY DISTRICT The CHAIRMAN. Before you begin, Mr. Dillon, I would like for Colonel West to state for the record the situation with respect to the Scioto-Sandusky projects and have him tell when those reports that are now being studied will be likely to be submitted. Colonel WEST. I believe they are scheduled for submission about September 1. That covers a restudy of the entire Scioto-Sandusky system. The CHAIRMAN. Mr. Pretzman, we are glad to have you here, but you understand our hearings are confined to the reports that have been submitted and to the reports that have been transmitted to Congress, either submitted to the Bureau of the Budget or submitted to Congress. You gentlemen are here, and if you have a statement in behalf of the Sandusky-Scioto projects, we will be glad to have you submit your statement and give us the high points of those statements. You may tell us what you advocate. Mr. DILLON. It is a legal entity. Those 17 counties start from Lake Erie and go right down to Portsmouth via the Sandusky-Scioto River systems. They go right down to the Ohio River. The overall plan contemplates about 10 reservoirs, one of which is in process of construction, and that is the Delaware Reservoir on the Olentangy River, which is a tributary of the Scioto, and eight or nine other reservoirs, four of which have been approved by the Army engineers, and one of which was mentioned this morning; to wit, the Rocky Fork near Bainbridge, which is about 10 miles from Chillicothe, Ohio. This over-all plan which the district has been proposing and supporting for some 10 years has, as I say, been about half approved by the Army engineers. In that respect I believe I mentioned it in referring to the subject you mentioned a moment ago. The CHAIRMAN. Are there any projects between Chillicothe and Portsmouth in the district of Mr. McCowen there in which your organization is interested? Are there any projects there? Mr. DILLON. Do you refer to the territory between Chillicothe and Portsmouth? Thes CHAIRMAN. Yes. Mr. DILLON. Salt Creek. The CHAIRMAN: Is that a reservoir? Mr. DILLON. That is a proposed reservoir. Mr. DILLON. Yes, sir. The CHAIRMAN. Where does the Baltimore and Ohio main line go into Cincinnati? Does it cross the Scioto at Chillicothe? Mr. DILLON. No, the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad runs through Chillicothe. The CHAIRMAN. What about the Scioto River, does it go through Chillicothe? Mr. DILLON. Yes, sir, and down to Portsmouth and joins the Ohio at Portsmouth. The CHAIRMAN. This one dam between Chillicothe and Portsmouth, is that a distance of something like 100 miles? Mr. DILLON. I believe you mean Portsmouth to Columbus. The CHAIRMAN. Yes. What is the distance? Mr. DILLON. The distance is about 94 miles. The CHAIRMAN. These proposed reservoirs you are interested in, where does that Sandusky River enter? Mr. DILLON. It enters at Fremont. The CHAIRMAN. That is entirely different from the Scioto? The CHAIRMAN. In whose district is the Delaware Reservoir? The CHAIRMAN. He was here, and probably will want to make a statement later on, but that is under way? Mr. DILLON. Yes. The CHAIRMAN. The only reservoir under construction in your Scioto area is the Delaware Reservoir? Mr. DILLON. That is right. The CHAIRMAN. That is in Delaware County? Mr. DILLON. Yes. The CHAIRMAN. You have a university or college up there? The CHAIRMAN. That is right. I know one of your Senators was a former teacher in that institution. We was down here when I came. The CHAIRMAN. Generally, you favor this proposed solution in both of these basins? Mr. DILLON. We very heartily approve of it, and are particularly in favor of the project which has been approved to date by the Army engineers. We are very much in favor of the authorization you have before you today. The one project which the Army engineers mentioned this morning, Rocky Fork, which is shown in red there as being the one in favor, is near the home of Mr. E. F. Bearce, who is the president of the Scioto Conservancy District, and one of the three directors, and I will ask in a few minutes for Mr. Bearce, who is here, to make a statement. The CHAIRMAN. We will be glad to hear him. Mr. DILLON. May I at this time present this statement? The CHAIRMAN. We will be glad to have your statement. (The statement referred to is as follows:) STATEMENT BY E. W. DILLON, ATTORNEY FOR SCIOTA-SANDUSKY CONSERVANCY DISTRICT The Scioto-Sandusky Conservancy District was organized under the Conservancy Act of Ohio 6828-1 upon petitions of more than 500 freeholders. The district was established December 4, 1934, by order of the conservancy court of 17 common pleas judges, representing the following counties: Sandusky, Seneca, Wyandotte, Marion, Delaware, Crawford, Morrow, Union, Madison, Fayette, Highland, Franklin, Pickaway, Ross, Pike, Vinton, and Scioto. The objects of the district are: preventing floods; conserving flood waters for beneficial uses; regulating streams channels by changing, widening, and deepening the same; reclaiming and filling wet and overflowed lands; providing for irrigation where it may be needed; regulating the flow of streams; diverting, or in whole or in part eliminating, water courses; to build reservoirs, canals, levees, walls, embankments, bridges, or dams; to maintain, operate, and repair any of the construction herein named, and to do all other things necessary for the fulfillment of the purposes of the proposed district, such as forestation, the building of check dams, and other control works to prevent soil erosion and the consequent clogging of stream channels. The district employed Prof. C. E. Sherman, of Ohio State University, who, in 1935, presented a report contemplating the building of reservoirs throughout the entire district, affecting, among other communities, the cities and towns of Fremont, Tiffin, Upper Sandusky, Bucyrus, Marion, Mount Gilead, Delaware, Columbus, Chillicothe, Circleville, Waverly, Jackson, and Portsmouth. These proposed reservoirs were: (1) Above Tiffin; (2) The Summit Level Diversion Reservoir; (3) Delaware; (4) Bellepoint in Delaware County; (5) Central College on Big Walnut Creek, which is about 10 miles north of Columbus; (6) On the Big Darby below Harrisburg; (7) Deer Creek, 13 miles west of Circleville; (8) Paint Creek, 5 miles southwest of Chillicothe; (9) Salt Creek, 12 miles southeast of Chillicothe. The plan as a whole was rejected by the Army engineers during the time that the Flood Control Act of Congress permitted only the benefits from flood control to be computed by the engineers, for the reason that the necessary ratio of 1 to 1 (i. e., $1 benefit for every dollar expended) could not be reached. Since that time the Flood Control Act has been amended so that in addition to benefits from flood control, special benefits, particularly water usage, can be used in computing the benefits as against costs. Under this new formula, the Army engineers have already approved portions of the so-called Sherman plan, in that the projects contemplated at or near Delaware, on Big Darby, Deer Creek, Paint Creek, and in addition a project on Rocky Fork which flows into Paint Creek, have been approved. The Delaware Dam project is now in the process of construction. What might be termed the back-bone of this entire conservancy district project is the Summit Level Diversion and Reservoir. This will not only afford flood protection for almost the entire Scioto-Sandusky Valley running from the Great Lakes to the Ohio River but will provide special benefits for many of the communities both north and south of this proposed project. It will insure a continuous, dependable water supply for Fremont, Tiffin, Marion, Columbus, Circleville, and Chillicothe. Some of these special benefits may extend as far south as Portsmouth, Ohio. The Army engineers are undertaking a resurvey of this Summit Level project.` As we understand it, their survey will be made from the flood-control angle. The Scioto-Sandusky conservancy district has employed an engineer whose duties it will be to prepare and submit to the Army engineers an estimate on special benefits flowing from this Summit Level Reservoir. We confidently believe that a fair appraisal of both general and special benefits will result in a finding that the benefits from this proposed Summit Level Diversion and Reservoir will equal or exceed the costs and that the communities which will profit by and pay for these benefits will find that their share of the project can be done much more economically in conjunction with the Army engineers than should they attempt the same or similar projects on their own. We feel confident that after this survey has been made, the Army engineers will approve of this major project and will want to include it in their plans for next year, and it is with this thought in mind that we of the conservancy district urge that sufficient funds be au thorized at this time to permit the Army engineers, if their report is favorable, to select the Summit Level Diversion and Reservoir project as one of those to be included in the over-all increase in authorization which will shortly be considered by Congress. The CHAIRMAN. Are there any questions from the committee? Evidently there are none. STATEMENT OF E. F. BEARCE, PRESIDENT OF THE SCIOTOSANDUSKY CONSERVANCY DISTRICT The CHAIRMAN. This embraces both basins? Mr. BEARCE. Yes. The CHAIRMAN. It is authorized by the courts of Ohio, under the court of common pleas? Mr. BEARCE. Yes, sir. The CHAIRMAN. It was a similar district that constructed the first dams that were constructed in the United States along the Miami River following the great flood of 1913, it was the first of the floodcontrol dams? Mr. BEARCE. Yes, sir. The CHAIRMAN. You may proceed, sir. If you have a statement, you may file it and give us the high points of that statement. Mr. BEARCE. I just wanted to make a few remarks, Mr. Chairman, and I only want to take a little time with the committee. Chillicothe, Ohio, is a town of 25,000 inhabitants and Ross County has about 45,000. The Paint Creek that comes down through Rocky Fork through Bainbridge and Bourneville to Chillicothe, I wish to tell you a little story about that: South of the Chillicothe corporation line about 10 years ago they started to build up a community and they built up about 60 families and 60 houses there. The men of the community tried to get some control over the excessive floods that were continually running through that country and washing them out, without success. The ladies then took the situation up and decided they were going to do something about it. They developed this petition without anyone telling them to do it. It is a petition of about 600 names. They did not know what to do with this petition after they got it. They piled in some cars and went to the State highway department and presented it to Mr. Perry Ford, the head of the State highway department. Mr. Ford was very courteous to them and told them he would do everything he could. They finally agreed they would repair the levee temporarily, following which they had a mass meeting of the people. I was invited to attend the meeting and to give my views of it. These people were continually talking about levees and the highway department's responsibilities. I finally told them probably with some authority, that their only hope of getting rid of their difficulty was to have the development at Rocky Fork and upper Paint Creek which would control the flash floods and keep them from washing out lands and washing out their highways which it had a habit of doing annually, or twice annually. At one time it washed a hole in route 23, which is a national highway, about 10 feet deep. In addition to these people in this particular area, the flash floods on Paint Creek also menaced the lower part of the city of Chillicothe, backing up into the streets a distance of about 300 yards and flooding them, and also flooding the two paper mills. These paper mills have an investment of something like $25,000,000 or $30,000,000. It not only means a damage each year to the mills but also means a loss in production and employment. The CHAIRMAN. What do you make paper out of? Mr. BEARCE. They make it out of wood pulp. The CHAIRMAN. Where do you get your wood? Mr. BEARCE. We buy some from the west coast, Canada, and the State of Maine and wherever we can get it. We get some southern wood, Mr. Chairman. Any kind of wood we can get, we use. In addition to the damages that accrued as a result of these annual floods and the residents of this district and the paper mills, we have a very rich agricultural area between Bainbridge, which is about 10 miles north of Chillicothe. It is a very rich agricultural land. These annual floods have a habit of flowing over these lands and taking this top soil down to your territory, Mr. Chairman. We are very jealous of it and we want to keep it. The CHAIRMAN. I wish you would. Mr. BEARCE. Paint Creek has a drainage area of 808 square miles at this point. It is interesting to note that in 1937, the maximum flow in that area was 49,700 second-feet and the minimum is only 6.7 second-feet, which indicates that we are losing our water all at once. We would like to conserve that water and hold it for a more uniform flow of the creek that will be of great benefit to the whole district. The CHAIRMAN. As I recall, along the Scioto, and if I am not correct, you correct me for the record, the local people there through the years have constructed levees for protection, have they not? Mr. BEARCE. They had a proposition up to construct the levee. Pending some developments on the upper Scioto which would hold back the flash floods, we have postponed it. In 1913 the water broke through to the north end of the city and washed the whole city out. In 1937 it came within 3 feet of doing the same thing. However, we are trusting on the development of the Olentangy and certain other developments on the Scioto River north of the city to prevent us putting a flood wall around for the simple reason that a flood wall could not be built that would protect the whole city. The CHAIRMAN. Do you have some that protect your rural lands along that stream? Mr. BEARCE. We have nothing whatever. The CHAIRMAN. We are glad to have had your statement. Are there any other matters you wish to emphasize, except with respect to the topsoil and the other matters you mentioned? Mr. BEARCE. I believe that is all, including the protection from the flash floods. The CHAIRMAN. You will have to take up all these matters again when the reports come in. Mr. BEARCE. If you would be interested in seeing this conglomeration of signatures, we will leave the document with you. The CHAIRMAN. You may leave it with the clerk of the committee. Is there anyone else here? |