Governor RIDLEY. In this case, these locks are a big thing. It is going to take contractors up here with experience and funds and the ability to carry it out. Senator O'MAHONEY. In other words, this would be built by American contractors and America labor. Governor RIDLEY. Well, I won't say that all the labor will be American, because they will probably use some tropical labor. Senator O'MAHONEY. Well, with the exception of that labor that you must use down there. Governor RIDLEY. In our bill we are restricted to certain positions. Senator TOWNSEND. A very large percent of the materials is cement, is it not? Governor RIDLEY. Yes, sir. Senator TOWNSEND. Belgium, of course, has been a great competitor of American cement and I did not know whether that would be considered or not. Senator HAYDEN. I rather think it would not offhand, because our "Buy American" provision is that all provisions for the Army throughout the world must be American in origin, unless there is a price differential of more than 25 percent. I imagine the same rule would apply there. (There was a discussion off the record.) Senator HAYDEN. If there are no further proceedings, we will recess until 10:30 Tuesday. (Whereupon, at 12:20 p. m., the committee took a recess, to meet again at 10:30 a. m., Tuesday, March 19, 1940.) WAR DEPARTMENT CIVIL FUNCTIONS APPROPRIATION BILL, 1941 TUESDAY, MARCH 19, 1940 UNITED STATES SENATE, SUBCOMMITTEE OF THE Washington, D. C. The subcommittee met, pursuant to call, at 10:30 a. m., in the hearing room, Capitol, Hon. Elmer Thomas (chairman) presiding. Present: Senators Thomas (chairman), Hayden, Chavez, McNary, and Austin. Senator THOMAS. The committee will be in order. We have set aside this morning to hear General Schley, Chief of Engineers. General Schley is present, so we will hear him first. General, you may take the stand right in front of the reporter RIVERS AND HARBORS AND FLOOD CONTROL STATEMENTS OF MAJ. GEN. JULIAN L. SCHLEY, CHIEF OF ENGINEERS, CAPT. PETER A. FERINGA, AND CAPT. MILES REBER, OFFICE OF CHIEF OF ENGINEERS GENERAL STATEMENT Senator THOMAS. General, please state for the record the things that the record should show relative to the operations of your Department and what you want in this bill for next year. I might say at the beginning that this is an economy Congress, and we are all for economy for the other fellow's district but not for ours. General SCHLEY. Mr. Chairman, the report of the House Appropriations Committee is available with the figures which they recommended originally therein. It is House Report 1681, House of Representatives, Seventy-sixth Congress, Third session; and the hearings conducted by that committee have been printed and are also available. HOUSE ACTION IN REFERENCE TO RIVERS AND HARBORS The amounts which the House of Representatives have approved are practically the same as the Budget figures. In the case of navigation projects, that is, rivers and harbors, you will see on page 3 of the report of the committee the comparison between the current appropriation, the 1941 estimate, which is the Budget figure, and the committee recommendation. In the case of maintenance of rivers and harbors, on navigation projects, the figures, as you see, are very much the same. There has been a slight reduction of the committee's figures below the Budget figures, and the Budget figures were a little bit lower than the current appropriation. In the case of "Improvement," there was also a very slight reduction of the committee's recommendation below the Budget figures, the Budget figures being $25,000,000 and the committee's figures being $24,300,000. Both of those, however, are only half as much as we have this year. The totals, therefore, for navigation projects, as shown by that same table on page 3 of the House committee's report, show for the current year that we have for navigation projects $96,000,000, the Budget figures, $68,773,050, and the committee's recommendation, $66,721,510. The manner whereby the House committee suggested that the reduction be made in "Maintenance" is shown by items 1, 2, 3, and 4 on that same page. BUDGET ESTIMATE ALLOWED FOR FLOOD CONTROL Flood control is shown on page 4, and the committee recommend the same amount which the Budget allowed-$70,000,000. The current appropriation, $133,000,000, is practically twice the sum which is being proposed for the fiscal year 1941. The principal change which the appropriation comittee of the House made in what we submitted to cover that $70,000,000, the Budget figure, applies to our proposal that no new projects be commenced. The reason for that proposal was that, since the total was so much smaller than that which we have been working on in the previous year, we decided that it was better policy to continue those projects which had already been commenced. A project should be carried to completion with reasonable speed or it becomes very uneconomical, and also a flood-control project does not become effective, of course, until it is finished. HOUSE RECOMMENDATION THAT 10 PERCENT OF FUNDS BE APPLIED TO NEW CONSTRUCTION The House committee, however, saw fit to recommend that instead of all that money being applied to continue works already commenced, a part of it, roughly 10 percent, be applied to new projects, and it left to my Department the selection of those which were to be commenced under that item of approximately 6 million. LISTS OF RIVER AND HARBOR AND FLOOD CONTROL PROJECTS INCLUDED IN ESTIMATES In the case of navigation projects, the list which we propose to undertake is shown on pages 107 and 108 of the hearings of the House committee, the maintenance list is shown on pages 119 to 125, and the list for flood control is shown on pages 4, 5, and 6 of the House report. The latter list, however, has to be amended, because we have not in there the new work to be undertaken but only what we had proposed under the assumption that all the money would be spent to continue the construction of projects already commenced. NEW PROJECTS PROPOSED UNDER HOUSE RECOMMENDATION THAT 10 PERCENT OF FUNDS FOR FLOOD CONTROL BE SPENT ON NEW CONSTRUCTION Senator THOMAS. Do you have the list of the projects that you recommend be initiated under this additional fund? General SCHLEY. Yes, sir; we have selected such a list on the assumption that this committee would be interested in seeing it: Three local protective works; that is, flood walls and levees to protect three cities, namely, Elmira, N. Y., $400,000; Parkersburg, W. Va., $600,000; and Cincinnati, $800,000; and for flood-control reservoirs to be commenced, Canton Reservoir, Oklahoma, $1,400,000; Hulah Reservoir, Oklahoma, $1,758,420; Santa Fe, Calif., $1,500,000; and Department of Agriculture preliminary examinations and surveys, $500,000, making a total of $6,958,420, of which $6,458,420 was the amount which the committee preferred that we spend for commencing new projects. INCREASE IN AMOUNT FOR COOPERATION WITH DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE Senator HAYDEN. Without this change, there would be no money to cooperate with the Department of Agriculture. Was that eliminated in the estimate? General SCHLEY. Yes, sir; there would be. This is an increase in that sum. Senator HAYDEN. Making it $2,000,000? General SCHLEY. Making it $2,000,000 instead of a million and a half. The House committee indicated that they would rather have that raised to $2,000,000. Senator HAYDEN. How are you getting along in that cooperative work with the Department of Agriculture? General SCHLEY. Excellently, sir. We have done so in all our hearings in the field. We notify the local Department of Agriculture representatives, they usually attend our hearings, and if they wish to do so they assist in conducting the hearings. And in Washington, similarly, we have every possible cooperation between the two Departments. Yes, the same statement is true of the Reclamation Bureau, when we are dealing with the semiarid sections of the country. PROJECT AT SANTA FE, CALIF. Senator HAYDEN. You mentioned a reservoir in California. Senator HAYDEN. Where is that; in southern California? General SCHLEY. On the San Gabriel River. Senator HAYDEN. San Gabriel. That is where they had those very disastrous floods? General SCHLEY. Yes, sir; it is a part of the approved program for that protection. FLOOD CONTROL ON THE SACRAMENTO RIVER Senator HAYDEN. Speaking of California and of that flood, I notice some basic pictures of the town of Marysville, very badly flooded, and Congressman Lea of California has sent me a publication by the California State Highway Department. It is in the March issue of "California Highways and Public Works", and I wish to insert it in the record at this point. (The article referred to above is as follows:) FLOOD WATERS COVER 500,000 ACRES Four days of torrential rains, beginning on February 25, sent the rivers of northern California out of their banks, flooding approximately 275,000 acres of farm land and 225,000 acres of bypass and overflow areas in the Sacramento Valley, causing damages to levees estimated at $500,000. Estimates of the total damage to crops and property range variously from $10,000,000 to $16,000,000. Until complete surveys have been made, accurate estimates of the total storm damage are impossible. Beginning with moderately heavy rains, the storm increased in intensity until February 27 when the heaviest rainfall figures were recorded. The full force of the storm centered in the Sierra Nevada along the watershed of the Yuba, Feather, and Sacramento Rivers. Heavy rainfalls were also recorded along the north coast. South of the American River watershed the storm raged in short torrential downpours of cloudburst proportions. As the intensity of the storm increased and it became evident an emergency was imminent, every available engineer in the State division of water resources was assigned to the direction of emergency repair crews, river patrol work, and stream gaging. State Engineer Edward Hyatt obtained the services of 650 Work Projects Administration workers for emergency work on levees and patrol work. In addition hundreds of others volunteered for patrol duty and aided in sandbagging weakened levees. SACRAMENTO RIVER ON RAMPAGE Chief destructionist of the storm was the mighty Sacramento River which went on a rampage of record proportions. As the crest of the flood waters swept southward, new high-water records were set by the Sacramento at all points from Kennett to Knights Landing where the bypass system took the brunt of the burden. The 4 days of rains, the heaviest of which struck the watershed above Kennett, where Shasta Dam is now under construction, sent the Sacramento River stage to 36.3 feet at the Kennett gage of the United States Weather Bureau. This is 3.1 feet above the highest stage ever recorded by the Bureau at that point, which was in 1907, when the gage recorded 33.2 feet, and 7.3 feet above the 29-foot crest at Kennett in the 1937 flood. First city to feel the full force of the raging river was Redding, where 500. people were forced to flee from homes in the low-lying sections in the outskirts of the city. The city filtration plant was temporarily put out of commission, the new Southern bridges leading into the city damaged, and portions of the Cottonwood Pacific Railroad bridge and highway irrigation canal washed out. In the Sacramento River Canyon, between Redding and Dunsmuir, slides on the Southern Pacific right-of-way blocked rail traffic until March 5. FARM LANDS INUNDATED Orland As the crest of the flood surged southward it broke through levees inundating many thousands of acres of fertile farm lands, driving hundreds from their homes, drowning stock that was caught in the lowlands, and wreaking general havoc. It is estimated that 6,000 people were forced to flee from their homes. However, not all of the damage came from the Sacramento River. and Hamilton City were caught in the overflow of Stoney Creek and flooded. The water following the main highway into Orland spread out through the residential and business districts. Families west of Orland were evacuated in boats. The water reached a depth of 8 feet in parts of that area. On the east side of the Sacramento River, Mill and Deer Creeks left their banks, flooding large areas of wheat lands adjoining the Sacramento Highway, traffic on 99E was completely cut off at Vina for 3 days. Below Chico flood waters from Butte Creek and from Feather River overflow above Honcut spread out over hundreds of acres of land and the highway from Durham south to Biggs was under water most of the distance. Butte Creek also fanned out into the Butte Basin. |