| Show WATER WANTED 1 A Reasonable Proposition Presented SALT LAKE CITY May 17 1884 Editors Herald Allow me through your column on behalf of myself and other residents res-idents of Hebera bench to present for the consideration of members of the City Council Lnd others a suggestion sug-gestion for a solution of the vexed question of water supply for the dry benches of this city which in the form of a petition will shortly be laid before the Council The suggestion in queston forms part of a petition for irrigating water from she property holders 01 the bench referred to As is well known to most of year readers the longstanding objection to the granting a share of CityCreek water to the residents of the dry portions of the city benches as expressed > ex-pressed by past City counc Is has been the fear that grants of su h water to these localities in the season sea-son of the year whtn it Ic pleitjful I might ebtitle them tc cl im it in the career periods tJ the de rimen of the so called old eottlerV whose rights have been supposed to be paramount As many persons also know well petition after petition has been ignored ig-nored or set aside on thesa grounds and for so many years that at least one member of the present Council it appears has had time tD grow up Jrom a boy to a man in the interim I with the probability tbt the gentler gentle-r man in question will yet have time to become an old man before the prayer of such petitions ia granted unless future petitioners present their applications in a form that will in advance rule this stereotyped stereo-typed objection out of existence The fault in past petitions appears ap-pears to have been that the petitioners petition-ers have asked rather vaguely for a water supply leaving it open to supposition that they expected to obtain an equal proportion of City Creek with the older settlers a supposition sup-position of course always liable to grouse antRgonism and provoke opposition and delay as long as such a construction of the petition is possible To end this difficulty at once and eliminate Entirely from the matter of water supply to the benches this perpetual question about the eriper I ior rights of the old settlers the present I petitJoner6 propose to state distinctly that they petition only for that portion of City Creek water which goes to waste down Jordan street As a simple method by which as it appears to them this waste water can be used by the benches without a possibility of injury to the rights ot the old settlers the petitioners will respectfully suggest to the Council that the number of inches of water that is known by experience to be sufficient to meet the demands of the old settlers of Salt Lake City in moderate seasons be ascertained as-certained by their engineers and that that amount be set apart and conveyed to them under all circumstances cIrcum-stances and that the surplus water over this amount so long as there is any be divided in air proportion j between the petitioning benches In other words they will simply ask the Council to grant that just as long as there is any water going to waste down Jordan street that a volume of water equal to that amount be placed at tne disposal of the dry portion of the benches Inasmuch as an ordinance of this and cannot render the C ty Council liable to a demand lor more water than tho amount which they specifically ifically grant namely the wate water after the needs of the older settlers are supplied and cannot therefore involve them in any con lict with preexisting rights it is believed that this form or petition will remove this longstanding objection ob-jection out of the way of the Council Coun-cil and that they will be only too willing to respond to the prayer of such a petition It is therefore hoped that petitioning parties from other dry bench localities will construct con-struct their applications upon this principle BO as to avoid further objections actions and delays Of course it is well enough understood un-derstood that such an amount of water as can be obtained upon this principle will not be as much as would be desirable under better circumstances but it is aa much of City Creek water as can be had anyway and will be no small I amount of benefit if obtained Applicants Ap-plicants for water on this principle will moreover waive no right which as citizens they may possess to a share of any other water which may come within the control of the CJjunciJ While on the other bandit band-it will put at once within the reach of the distressed residents of the bench lands a very valuable amount of present relief Tht a petition framed upon the principle m question will be granted cannot be doubted No Jody of reasonable men can deny to their fellow creatures that which no one else wants or can by any possibility use In utter default of a better use it is now turned loose every day into Jordan street oft times as it happens simply to tear it to piecea and drown the lowland farms around the Lake Practicallyall that is asked of the City Council by a petition pe-tition of this kind is that instead of letiing this river of fertilization go to waste and destruction that they separate it from theat present utilized portion sufficiently high up the canyon to be avalabh f > r the beautIfication and upbuiding of the city the interests of whieli they are sworn to maintain Athc1r izt t lime they make a cally tSfin f this vast mass of fertilizing power to the mere air to the sunshine and to Great Salt Lake and certainly t they cannot deny it to their fellow citzens Respectfully I E L T HARBISON |
