The CHAIRMAN. Is there not a reservoir somewhere there? Colonel GOETHALS. There is a reservoir named Loyalhanna Creek; yes. It is near the mouth of the stream. The CHAIRMAN. That reservoir is primarily for the protection of Pittsburgh, is it not? Colonel GOETHALS. Yes, sir. The CHAIRMAN. You may proceed. Colonel GOETHALS. The town of Latrobe is in a general industrial area and contains several important manufacturing plants, with a branch of the Pennsylvania Railroad and a United States and two State highways passing through. At the present time there is no existing Federal flood-control project purely for the protection of Latrobe. There have been no improvements for the protection of the borough by local interests, and they wish such improvements undertaken as would afford relief. After due study a plan of improvement has been recommended for a channel extending from the vicinity of the east end of Chambers Street, as indicated on this map, downstream for about 10,000 feet, making a cut-off to improve conditions at the sharp bend of the creek in the lower part of the town, and designed to carry a flood of 12,000 second-feet at the no-damage stage. This improvement would reduce by over a foot and a half the stage of a flood equivalent to the maximum of record and would lower the stages of possible larger floods, at a Federal investment of $112,500 for construction and $5.200 furnished by local interests. There is a favorable cost to benefit ratio of 1 to 1.2 with the customary conditions of local cooperation. Nothing exceptional in the way of local cooperation. The CHAIRMAN. When you come to the correction of your statement, if this report which you have stated is on its way, should reach the committee before we conclude our hearing, will you insert the number of the report for identification? Colonel GOETHALS. Yes; as soon as we know the document number. (The document referred to is H. Doc. No. 444, 78th Cong., 2d sess.) The CHAIRMAN. And you will obtain it just as soon as it has been transmitted to Congress, even though the report itself is not published; and will you make available your copy for the committee if it is desired? Colonel GOETHALS. Yes, sir. The CHAIRMAN. There are no other reports that have been submitted since the June hearings? Colonel GOETHALS. No, sir. OHIO VALLEY STATEMENT OF ALAN N. JORDAN, EXECUTIVE SECRETARY, OHIO VALLEY CONSERVATION AND FLOOD CONTROL CONGRESS The CHAIRMAN. Mr. Jordan, I believe you made a statement at the June hearings, and wish to submit a supplemental statement? Mr. JORDAN. All I want to do is to supplement my testimony of last June by requesting that the bill include $100,000,000 to carry authorization for the Ohio Valley. The CHAIRMAN. For the benefit of the record, will you state your name and the interest which you represent? Mr. JORDAN. My name is Alan N. Jordan. I am executive secretary of the Ohio Valley Conservation and Flood Control Congress. The CHAIRMAN. You appeared, as you stated, in June and submitted a rather comprehensive statement and a most excellent argument in behalf of additional authorizations for the projects that had been approved and for which we had made initial appropriation? Mr. JORDAN. Yes, sir. The CHAIRMAN. We will be glad to have you enlarge on your statement, if you desire. Mr. JORDAN. In order to have further projects started on the Ohio River they will have to have additional money authorizations, and we are asking that $100,000,000 be made available for projects on the Ohio River. The CHAIRMAN. I would like to have inserted in the record a letter from Mr. Forest A. Harness, of the Fifth Congressional District of Indiana, dated February 11, 1944, addressed to the chairman of this committee. (The letter referred to and submitted by the chairman is as follows:) Hon. WILLIAM M. WHITTINGTON, HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, Washington, D. C. February 11, 1944. Chairman, Committee on Flood Control House of Representatives, Washington, D. C. MY DEAR COLLEAGUE: Pursuant to your suggestion during our recent discussion of the matter, I take this means of inviting the committee's attention to the recurring and increasingly serious problems confronting the people of an important portion of my district as a result of uncontrolled floods along the upper Wabash River and its tributaries, particularly the Mississinewa River. These rivers flow through one of the richest and most productive farming areas to be found anywhere. Along these courses lie, in my district, the cities of Marion, Huntington, Wabash, and Peru, all of which are important, even though comparatively small, centers of industry. Each of these communities is contributing in a direct and important manner in our present war effort. Everyone of the farms lying in the basin of these rivers is producing a full share of the Nation's vital food supplies. Yet this area year after year faces the danger of damaging floods. In fact, only rarely in flood season does the area escape serious losses. Only scanty and inadequate protection has ever been provided against these recurring losses, although I am confident that a very small investment for the protection of this area would yield rich dividends over a long period. Study of the specific problem indicates that the primary need is for cleaning, dredging, and in some instances straightening channels. Over a long period of years natural obstructions have developed in these channels. Originating perhaps in flood debris, actual islands have grown and choked the original channel in numerous places. These channel obstructions even in normal stages have forced the streams to broaden materially, and to change course. The result has been the steady loss of rich adjoining land. In flood periods, of course, the present choked and crooked channels are totally inadequate to handle the increased volume of water; and totally abnormal inundation results. I am sure the committee will find these facts fully substantiated in the studies which the Engineer Office, War Department, has made of these streams in recent years. The committee will find, also, that the engineers are now completing further studies, and that the reports of the district engineer, Louisville, and the division engineer, Ohio River division, are expected within 90 days. The committee will perhaps find it significant that the reports now in process have been long delayed and would doubtless have been completed some time ago but for the latest disastrous flood in the Wabash Valley, which I understand nullified the earlier parts of the present studies. I urge the committee to consider the problems of this particular area carefully, and to provide adequate protection in the flood-control measure now under consideration by your committee. Naturally I am glad to work with the committee in every possible way, and shall gladly provide any detailed information or material which may be necessary. Assuring the committee again of my firm conviction that any assistance which may be provided for this area will be fully merited, I am Respectfully yours, FOREST A. HARNESS. The CHAIRMAN. In this connection, Colonel Goethals, I will ask you to insert in the record the situation with respect to the work that you are doing to provide for flood control in the areas mentioned along the Wabash River and its tributaries; and if there are any flood-control projects authorized there in the act of 1936-and my recollection is that there are some-I will ask you to give their status in the revision of your remarks. Colonel GOETHALS. Very well, sir. (The statement called for is as follows:) The Department is now making a detailed survey of the Wabash River and its tributaries, Indiana and Illinois, under several directives from the Congress. That report is now scheduled to be received in the office of the Chief of Engineers on or about August 14, 1944. The field work and the preparation of the report on this investigation has been assigned to the district engineer at Louisville, Ky., under the general supervision of the division engineer of the Ohio River division. This investigation is very comprehensive in scope and is designed to determine the best flood-control plan in the Wabash River Basin and will include consideration of the following methods of flood control: Levees, channel rectification, diversion, and reservoirs. In this connection it may be stated that the division and district engineers are giving careful consideration to the feasibility of constructing small reservoirs in the valley. The following local protection projects in the Fifth Congressional District of Indiana were specifically authorized in the 1936 Flood Control Act: WABASH RIVER Peru, Ind.—The plan of improvement at this locality provides for the reconstruction of approximately 2.4 miles of levee, the raising of this levee about 2 feet, stone paving, and the installation of drainage gates and culverts, and for minor sewer revisions, all at an estimated Federal cost of $118,000. Wabash, Ind.-The plan of improvement at this locality provides for the construction of levees to a height of 1 foot above the maximum flood of record, the installation of flood gates, and the reconstruction of sewers incidental to the levee construction, at an estimated Federal cost of $205,000. WEST FORK OF WHITE RIVER Anderson, Ind., on West Fork of White River.-The plan of improvement at this locality will provide protection to the residential section on the right bank and to the city utility plants on the left bank by the construction of levees, flood walls, and appurtenant works, at an estimated Federal cost of $127,000. None of the authorized local protection projects in the Fifth Congressional District of Indiana have been placed under way, as the conditions of local cooperation as set forth in the 1936 Flood Control Act have not been fulfilled. There are no authorized flood-control projects at Huntington or Marion, Ind. Peru and Wabash, Ind., were both flooded during the flood of May and June 1943; however, Anderson, Ind., on the west fork of White River, is located upstream from the area which was flooded in May and June of 1943. MAHONING VALLEY, OHIO STATEMENT OF KENNETH M. LLOYD, CHAIRMAN, ADVISORY COMMITTEE OF THE OHIO WATER SUPPLY BOARD The CHAIRMAN. What interests do you represent? Mr. LLOYD. My name is Kenneth M. Lloyd, and I am chairman of the advisory committee of the Ohio Water Supply Board. The CHAIRMAN. Mr. Lloyd, I assume you are familiar with the testimony that has been submitted with respect to that matter by Mr. Kirwan? Mr. LLOYD. Yes. The CHAIRMAN. And I suppose you have heard the statement of Colonel Goethals that they have no report on it? Mr. LLOYD. That it is being investigated in the field. The CHAIRMAN. This committee would be without any power or authority to include the proposal in any bill, because under the system that obtains we only include in our authorization projects on which reports have been submitted. I assume you have been in attendance at the hearing and have heard Colonel Goethals say that this matter in connection with the Berlin and Mosquito Creek Reservoirs is being studied and has not been transmitted to Congress, so that we have nothing officially before us? Mr. LLOYD. Sir, it is true that I stepped out a moment. The CHAIRMAN. You always lose something when you miss a minute here. Mr. LLOYD. I realize that. The CHAIRMAN. You are here in the interest of what project? way. The CHAIRMAN. That is the matter about which Representative Kirwan has previously testified this morning? Mr. LLOYD. That is correct. The CHAIRMAN. And the high points of your advocacy are what? Mr. LLOYD. As the chairman stated so clearly earlier in the hearing, the various agencies of the Federal Government, particularly the War Production Board, have found that the Mahoning Valley is a very important manufacturing area. The CHAIRMAN. That is right. Youngstown is located there. Mr. LLOYD. Yes. Our main problem is flood control, and a second problem, of almost equal importance, is low-flow control, because of the tremendous demand for water in the industry that exists there. The CHAIRMAN. This floodway is primarily for the low-water utilization? What is the purpose of the floodway? Mr. LLOYD. The purpose of the floodway is to give a hundred percent flood-control protection above Warren, Ohio; and by providing a hundred percent flood protection above Warren we make available for low-flow control those parts of the storage that are now reserved, particularly in the Berlin Reservoir, for impounding water in order that it might be released at a later date to augment the low-flow control in the Mahoning River. The CHAIRMAN. For what purpose? Mr. LLOYD. For the purpose of the steel industry. The CHAIRMAN. Go right ahead. Mr. LLOYD. And for the purpose of helping out on the sanitation. We have a very distinct sanitary problem there. We have a hardness problem-the question of the hardness of water which is used in the industrial plants, and then added to that, sir, is the problem of industrial waste which exists in this tremendous steel-production area. As you gentlemen know, we use a large amount of sulfuric acid in the water, and naturally that is a very bad hazard in the river, and it is something that needs dilution in order that this condition might be improved. The CHAIRMAN. You have just given us a summary of the proposed canal and the purposes that make it most desirable? Mr. LLOYD. Yes, sir; and for a more detailed statement the record will show my prepared statement. The CHAIRMAN. You may pass it to the reported to be inserted in the record. (The statement referred to and submitted by the witness is as follows:) My name is Kenneth M. Lloyd. I am chairman of the advisory committee of the Ohio Water Supply Board. The purpose of the Ohio Water Supply Board is to study and make reports to the Governor and the legislature on the water needs of the State of Ohio. I was appointed by Governor Bricker to represent particularly the Mahoning Valley, because this valley is recognized in Ohio as a most critical area from a water standpoint. I am also secretary of the Mahoning Valley Industrial Council with offices in Youngstown, Ohio. The Mahoning Valley Industrial Council is a trade association composed of all the principal industries doing business in the Mahoning Valley. You gentlemen know the Mahoning Valley as a steel producing area. In 1943 it produced 10,000,000 of the 90,000,000 tons of steel manufactured in the United States. This production is 11 percent of our national steel capacity. The importance of this tremendous tonnage to our war effort is not fully appreciated unless it is compared to that of other nations. About 15,000,000 tons of steel were produced last year in the British Isles. The British Government has gone to great length to protect this production from the ravages of war. The February 7, 1944, issue of News Week carries a notice that this production is hampered at the present time by the lack of water and that the British Government is deeply concerned. During the year immediately preceding Pearl Harbor, Japan produced 7,000,000 tons of steel. The production in the Mahoning Valley exceeded that of Japan by 3,000,000 tons, or 40 percent. In the face of these facts, we feel justified in asking this committee to assist us in protecting the vital steel production of the Mahoning Valley. Water is the lifeblood of the steel industry, as essential as iron ore, coal, or limestone. The metallurgical process is carried on at high temperatures. These temperatures so nearly approach the failing point of the best refractories known that great volumes of cooling water must be used constantly to prevent complete failure of the process. The daily demand for water in the Mahoning Valley is 1,002,000,000 gallons. The February 9, 1944, flow in the Mahoning River at Youngstown was 115,000,000 gallons per day, but it is estimated that the flow will be increased by 49,000,000 gallons per day when Mosquito Creek Reservoir is in full operation. This water is stored in periods of flood in the Berlin Reservoir, the Milton Reservoir, the Meander Reservoir, and the Mosquito Creek Reservoir, Meander Reservoir is used for domestic water supply for the cities of Youngstown and Niles. Hence its use is antagonistic to flood control, as it is the desire of the public officials operating it that it be kept as full as possible at all times in order to insure an adequate domestic water supply. The other reservoirs are used jointly for flood control and low-water regulation reservoirs for the industries. If the low-water regulation is to be increased, they should be kept as full as possible at all times. The members of the committee can readily realize how important an adequate water supply is to our steel capacity, but you can also appreciate our fear of floods if the camparatively small reservoirs on the Mahoning River are kept substantially full at all times. |