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Show Lack of agreement may be jeopardizing 'Mill Creek. Project start The lack of an agreement between the Grand County Water Conservancy District and Moab Irrigation Company is jeapordizing the future of the long-awaited Mill Creek Water Project, members of the Grand County Economic Development Devel-opment Committee were told Monday. Key to the start of construction of the major valley-wide water project is an agreement between the two agencies. Moab Irrigation Company, a publicly owned corporation, corpor-ation, has historic entitlements of water from Mill Creek, as do a handful of other valley water users. The Water Conservancy District, in its initial planning, made provisions lor guaranteeing the existing water rights, and utilizing all other waters from the stream for supplemental irrigation, culinary and industrial use throughout Spanish Valley and Moab City. The agreement, which still has not been inked by the two boards, was to spell out in detailed form, just how the downstream water rights were to be protected. A number of drafts prepared by attorney for the Grand County Water District, Michael M. Quealy of the firm of Clyde & Pratt, Salt Lake City; and Luke Pappas, Price, attorney for Moab Irrigation Company, Com-pany, have been reviewed by both boards and to date rejected by the Moab Irrigation Company board. An additional draft is now being prepared by the two attorneys and will be reviewed soon. "We have made a number of concessions in our months of negotiations," stated District board member, D. L. Taylor, "but each time we've come back with those i concessions incorporated into an agreement, Irrigation Company directors have come up with more," he said. The Director went on to say that the agreement between the two boards had been reached, in verbal terms, a number of times. But each time the terms were reduced to writing, they were unsatisfactory to the Moab Irrigation Irriga-tion Company. Ev Schumaker, executive director di-rector of the Water Conservancy District, told the committee Monday Mon-day that all of the agreements drawn up to date guaranteed 4600 acre feet of water to Moab Irrigation Company on an annual basis. "That, he said, is more than adequate for irrigation of lands currently owned by shareholders of Moab Irrigation, and is undoubtedly undoubted-ly more water than company owners have been using annually for many years." Could the lack of an agreement scuttle the Mill Creek Project? The possibilities seemed quite real Monday, according to those who reported at the breakfast meeting. "We've been told by the State Water Resources Board during the past week that unless we get this problem cleared up and an agreement signed in the next week or two, we can forget about the $3.5 million in state funding that was recently made available to Grand County from the State Water Resources Revolving Fund," Taylor Tay-lor said. Schumaker stated that the State agency now has requests for three times the $25 million in bonding that was approved by the recent legislative session. "If we can't use the money there are lots (Continued on Pg. A8) j- . i Mill Creek project ... j I (Continued From Page Al) J of other people who can," he said. ! Attorneys working on the most recent agreement draft are to have I their work completed some time j this week, and Grand County Water j Conservancy Board Chairman K. E. I McDougald is confident it will meet J with approval. That agreement will j be reviewed by the two boards, and j if Moab Irrigation Company direc- tors OK it, it then must be ratified j by a general stockholders' meeting, j Moab Irrigation Company held its I annual meeting two months ago, and at that time elected a new Board of Directors which then ! elected new officers. The meeting I was not adjourned, however, just j recessed so that the membership I could be called back for action at I such time as an agreement with the J Conservancy District could be ! voted on. "When we met with the Irrigation Company directors on March 10, they voted to take this agreement to their shareholders if j agreed-upon changes were made I by the attorneys," McDougald I said. He went on to say that he was j confident that shareholders, in ! general, were in favor of the Mill ! Creek Project and would vote to approve the agreement. j Director D. L. Taylor also j stated that he felt most share- ' holders of the Irrigation Company j supported the project, but wasn't ! so optimistic about the agreement- review meeting set soon with the company board. "We have gae j just about as far as we can go in concessions," Taylor said. "It is I my strong belief that if we make I any more concessions to Moab Irrigation Company, we won't have j a viable project constructed along i the lines as told the voters of Grand County last fall, who approved the project by a six to one majority." I |