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Show Conservancy District seeking relief in Red Fleet Dam cost over-run The Board of Directors of the Uintah Water Conservancy District, at a meeting held on September 6, 1979, directed its manager and attorney to proceed with studies relating to changes in the plans for construction of the'Red Fleet Dam. At this meeting the board authorized the hiring of a consultant to assist the district. Following the meeting the district retained Palmer B. DeLong to review the repayment contract for the Jensen Unit and to obtain all available information relating to costs of construction con-struction by Brown and Root Western, the contractor on the Red Fleet Dam. Red Fleet Dam and Reservoir is the principle feature of the Jensen Unit, Central Utah Project. A contract for construction was awarded by the Water and Power Resources Service to Brown and Root Western on April 15, 1977 at a low bid of $12.8 million. The dam is essentially complete and the contract should end on April 19, 1980. On December 19, 1979 the Water and Power Resources Service issued a news release headed "Red Fleet Dam Cost Increases to Improve Safety." The news release stated changes in the plans resulted from an effort to insure safety; also, that since 1977 there had been new developments in the "State of the Art" in dam building. As a result of the extensive changes, the Water and Power Resources Service Ser-vice has indicated that the Brown and Root Western contract is now set at $28.4 million, 2.2 times the original bid. Many of these changes have resulted from the failure of the Teton Dam on June 5, 1976. All of the planning had been accomplished prior to Teton Dam by the Water and Power Resources Service Ser-vice and the Uintah Water Conservancy District. A repayment contract vote on the Jensen Unit was approved by the citizens of the district on May 25, 1976. The vote was 1283 for and 159 against. The district manager and attorney, under the direction of the board, have been involved with Utah's Congressional Congres-sional Delegation and with officials of the Water and Power Resources Service Ser-vice to obtain some non-reimbursable funds for Red Fleet Dam. They have been exploring possibilities of obtaining this help under the Reclamation Safety of Dams Act of 1978, Public Law 95,578. Section 4(b) of this act provides that "costs heretofore or hereafter incurred in the modification of structures under this act, the cause of which results from hydrologic or seismic data or changes in the state of the art criteria deemed necessary for safety purposes shall be non-reimbursable and non-returnable under the Federal Reclamation Law." The manager and the attorney have, also, explored with Congressman Gunn McKay and the Water and Power Resources Service Commissioner, Keith Higginson, the alternative of proceeding pro-ceeding with an amendment to an Appropriation Ap-propriation Bill. This procedure appears, ap-pears, at this time, to be the better of the two methods that are being considered. con-sidered. To accomplish the desired results, the Water and Power Resources Service Ser-vice is evaluating all changes with explanations ex-planations for each change and the impact im-pact of each change on construction and supervision relating to "Safety of Dams". This report is being prepared and is essential to the proper evaluation and for background required with either approach. The Board of Directors of the district are very concerned with the excess costs involved in the construction of Red Fleet Dam and have proceeded with logical approaches to obtain answers and to obtain relief from these excessive costs through congressional action. s ' VAs.a. wVffev ili.- h'tv Li . :5d0lM to : Jtqfe 1 THE 23rd army national guard band led the Vernal Guard equipment parade Saturday morning. mor-ning. About 20 pieces of heavy equipment lined up for the parade. The band gave a clinic at the schools Friday. |
