The report has been transmitted to officials of the States of the Columbia River Basin and to the Secretary of the Army for their consideration and recommendations as required by the provisions of section 1 (c) of the Flood Control Act of 1944 (58 Stat. 887). It was also sent to the State of Idaho for the comments of the agency exercising administration over the wildlife resources of the area involved as required by provisions of the Act of August 14, 1946 (60 Stat. 1080), and to the Departments of Agriculture, Commerce, Labor, and Health, Education and Welfare, and the Federal Power Commission in accordance with interagency agreements. Favorable comments have been received from all reviewing agencies.

I recommend that the Little Wood River Project be authorized. I shall appreciate having advice concerning the relationship of the Little Wood River Project to your program before I transmit the report to the Congress for its consideration and appropriate action in accordance with the provisions of the Reclamation Project Act of 1939.

Sincerely yours,

(Signed)

DOUGLAS MCKAY, Secretary of the Interior.

EXECUTIVE OFFICE OF THE PRESIDENT,

BUREAU OF THE BUDGET, Washington 25, D. C., March 7, 1956.

The Honorable the SECRETARY OF THE INTERIOR.

MY DEAR MR. SECRETARY: This is in reply to your letter of February 13, 1956, submitting your report on the Little Wood River project, Idaho, and requesting advice as to its relationship to the program of the President.

This project would involve the raising of the existing Little Wood River Dam thereby increasing the capacity of the reservoir from 12,100 to 30,000 acre-feet to provide a supplemental water supply for 9,550 acres of presently irrigable land.

The estimated cost, based on January 1955 price levels, is $1,880,000 of which $328,000 allocated to flood control would be nonreimbursable, and $1,552,000 allocated to irrigation would be reimbursable, an average cost of about $162 per irrigable acre. The stated benefit-cost ratios on a 50-year period of analysis are 2.52 using total benefits and 1.98 considering only the direct benefits. Additional information indicates that the water users would have an incremental repayment capacity of about $4.42 per acre annually which compares with an estimated $4.39 per acre annual requirement to repay the reimbursable project construction cost in 40 years as well as the annual operation, maintenance, and replacement charges. The project area is presently improved

for irrigation and the proposed supplemental water supply could be fully utilized without additional distribution works or a development period.

Comments by concerned Federal agencies and by interested State and local agencies either support the proposed project or offer no objections. The Corps of Engineers states that the tentative allocation of project costs to flood control, amounting to $328,000, appears to be reasonable, but expresses the belief that the operation and maintenance costs should be capitalized on the basis of the 50-year period used for amortization of the project costs rather than the 100-year period used in the analysis. The Bureau of the Budget concurs in these expressed views of the Corps of Engineers.

Subject to your consideration of the above comment, the Bureau of the Budget would have no objection to the submission of your proposed report to the Congress. No commitment, however, can be made at this time as to when any estimate of appropriation would be submitted for construction of the project, if approved by the Congress, since this would be governed by the President's budgetary objectives as determined by the then prevailing fiscal situation.

It is requested that a copy of this letter be included with your report when it is submitted to the Congress.

Sincerely yours,

(Signed) PERCY RAPPAPORT,

Assistant Director.

UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR,

OFFICE OF THE SECRETARY, Washington 25, D. C., March 30, 1956.

Hon. SAM RAYBURN,

Speaker of the House of Representatives.

MY DEAR MR. SPEAKER: My report on the Little Wood River Project, Idaho, is transmitted herewith pursuant to the provisions of section 9 (a) of the Reclamation Project Act of 1939 (53 Stat. 1187). It contains favorable recommendations which augment the information contained in our January 11, 1956, letter to the Chairman, Committee on Interior and Insular Affairs, House of Representatives, commenting on H. R. 7850, a bill "To authorize the Secretary of the Interior to construct, operate, and maintain the Little Wood River reclamation project, Idaho."

The report presents a plan for raising the height of the existing Little Wood River Dam 45 feet to provide an additional water supply to 9,550 currently inadequately irrigated acres, in the vicinity of Carey, Blaine County, Idaho. These lands suffer water shortages after July of each year. Also, proper operation of the enlarged reservoir would afford needed flood control benefits to

downstream lands. The estimated cost of the project based on January 1955 price levels is $1,880,000. Of this amount $328,000 is allocated to flood control which is considered nonreimbursable and $1,552,000 to irrigation which is considered reimbursable and probably will be repaid in a 40-year period.

Copies of this Department's proposed report were transmitted to the States of Idaho, Montana, Nevada, Oregon, Utah, Washington, and Wyoming and to the Secretary of the Army for their views and recommendations in accordance with the provisions of section 1 of the Flood Control Act of December 22, 1944, and to the agencies represented on the Inter-Agency Committee on Water Resources for their information and comments. All States and Federal agencies commented and copies of the comments are enclosed with the report.

The report and copies of all comments received were transmitted to the President. Enclosed is a copy of the letter of comments of March 7, 1956, from Assistant Budget Director Percy Rappaport, in which he expresses preference for a slightly modified approach to determination of the flood control allocation. If Budget's suggestion was followed the flood control allocation would be decreased from $328,000 to $318,000 while the irrigation allocation would be increased in like amount. In either event the water users' repayment ability would be adequate to repay the capital costs allocated to irrigation in a 40-year period.

Sincerely yours,

(Signed) DOUGLAS MCKAY, Secretary of the Interior.

An act to authorize the Secretary of the Interior to construct, operate, and maintain the Little Wood River reclamation project, Idaho. (Act of August 6, 1956, 70 Stat. 1059, Public Law 993, 84th Cong., 2d sess.)

Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, That, for the principal purposes of improving the irrigation water supply of approximately ten thousand acres of land in Blaine County, Idaho, and assisting in the control of floods, the Secretary of the Interior is authorized to undertake an enlargement of the Little Wood River Reservoir and to operate and maintain the same in accordance with Federal reclamation laws (Act of June 17, 1902, 32 Stat. 388, and Acts amendatory thereof or supplementary thereto). Any contract entered into under section 9, subsection (d), of the Reclamation Project Act of 1939 (53 Stat. 1187, 1193; 43 U. S. C. 485h) for payment of those portions of the costs of constructing, operating, and maintaining the Little Wood River project which are properly allocable to irrigation and which are assigned to be paid by the contracting organization shall provide for the repayment of the construction cost over a period of not more than forty years or as near thereto as is consistent with the adoption and operation of a variable payment formula which, be

ing based on full repayment within the period stated under average conditions, permits variance in the required annual payments in the light of economic factors pertinent to the ability of the organization to pay.

SEC. 2. The Secretary is authorized to construct minimum basic public recreational facilities in connection with the Little Wood River project and to enter into appropriate arrangements for the operation and maintenance of the same by a State or local agency or organization. The cost of such facilities shall be nonreimbursable and nonreturnable under the reclamation laws.

SEC. 3. (a) The Secretary may make such reasonable provision in the works of the Little Wood River project as, upon further study in accordance with section 2 of the Act of August 14, 1946 (60 Stat. 1080, 16 U. S. C. 661a), he finds to be required for the preservation and propagation of fish and wildlife. An appropriate portion of the construction cost of the project shall be allocated as provided in said Act and it, together with the portion of the construction cost allocated to flood control and the portions of the operation and maintenance costs allocated to these functions or the capitalized value of the equivalent thereof, shall be nonreimbursable and nonreturnable under the reclamation laws.

(b) So far as the Secretary finds the same to be consistent with safety and with efficient operation or the primary purpose of the Little Wood River project, the project waters in the project area shall be open to free public use for lawful hunting and fishing purposes, and free access to the waters for those purposes shall be assured.

(c) Little Wood River Reservoir shall be operated in accord with water rights, under decree or permit, which are valid under the laws of the State of Idaho, but the Congress, taking cognizance of the need for clarification of certain of these rights in some formal manner effective under Idaho law, particulary as between the Fish and Game Department of said State and the water users under the Little Wood River project or their organizations, does not by this declaration accept for or impose upon the United States, its officers or employees any responsibility for determining the correctness of such claims of right and does not, either by the enactment of this Act or by any action taken pursuant thereto, intend to aid or prejudice the claims of any party to a dispute with respect thereto or to impose upon any party to a contract entered into under this Act any obligation with respect to such rights that does not exist under the laws of the State of Idaho or to require that water, other than that which is available under established rights, shall be used primarily either for irrigation or for the preservation of fish and wildlife resources.

SEC. 4. There are hereby authorized to be appropriated for construction of the Little Wood River project $1,880,000 plus such amounts, if any, as may be required by reason of changes in construction costs as indicated by engineering cost indexes applicable to the types of construction involved therein and, in addition, such amounts as may be required to operate and maintain said project.

LOWER YELLOWSTONE PROJECT

MONTANA-NORTH DAKOTA

The Lower Yellowstone project, originally called Fort Buford project, was authorized by the Secretary on May 10, 1904, pursuant to the Reclamation Act of 1902; it was examined and reported upon by a Board of Army Engineers and approved by the President on January 5, 1911, in accordance with the act of June 25, 1910 (36 Stat. 836).

BILLINGS, MONTANA,

April 23, 1904.

Mr. F. H. NEWELL,

Chief Engineer, United States Geological Survey.

SIR: We have examined the project above Ft. Buford on Yellowstone River, and have to report as follows:

The project as surveyed contemplates the diversion of Yellowstone River about two miles above Glendive, and the construction of about 82 miles of canal to cover a large tract of fine land lying along the lower Yellowstone in Montana and North Dakota.

The first twenty miles of this line is mostly heavy work, and we are of the opinion that the cost of the project would exceed $30 per acre, a price which we consider as the maximum at which the land would readily settle, under the provisions of the reclamation act.

It appears, however, that a lower line, diverting about 20 miles further east and covering less acreage, could be constructed at a less cost per acre, and would bring the price within a figure that could readily be obtained, and would cover as much land in North Dakota as the higher line. The existing surveys show elevations by which the position of the lower line can be approximated at any point, and we are of the opinion that at least 40,000 acres of good land can be irrigated by the system suggested, and that its cost will not much exceed twenty-five dollars per acre. We have, accordingly directed Mr. F. E. Weymouth to at once inaugurate surveys for the lower line, by which more definite figures can be made available early in June.