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Show Newly acquired reservoir will supply Weber Basin District with more water to sell ! By GARY R. BLODGETT LAYTON The addition of Smith Morehouse Reservoir will provide more than 8,000 acre-feet of water for sale by the Weber Basin Water Conservancy Dis- trict. I "Acquisition of the dam will add j 8,350 acre-feet to the Weber Basin ! system," said Ivan Flint, district j manager. "We sold the full limit of ! our water back in 1980 and so this additional water supply will put us back in business for more sale of water to communities and entities throughout Weber and Davis counties." coun-ties." Water is also provided to Morgan, Mor-gan, Summit, and a portion of south Box Elder County. He said upstream (runoff) water has been very scarce since 1980 yet the district has continued to expand ex-pand and provide additional culinary culin-ary and irrigation water. "That makes this new water source very valuable," said Mr. Flint. The newly acquired reservoir I will also provide additional water I to the district during dry years, it was explained. The Smith-Morehouse project located in the Wasatch National j Forest about 10 miles east of Oakley Oak-ley in Summit County was developed de-veloped over a three-year period at a cost of about $12 million. Utah Water Resources Director Larry Anderson, speaking at a recent re-cent dedication of the dam site, explained ex-plained that small reservoirs like ; Smith-Morehouse are vital to the overall system of a water distribution distribu-tion plan. He noted that these types of dams have been "life-savers" during drought conditions. The original Smith-Morehouse Dam was constructed in 1923 to ser ve ranchers and farmers in the are a and was developed into a park andl recreation site in 1940. The new expansion and development develop-ment of the reservoir for use by Weiber Basin was paid for jointly by Utah Water Resources and Weber We-ber Basin. Utah Water Resources paid 60 percent of the total cost with Weber Basin paying the 40 percent balance with proceeds from sale of the water. Wayne M. Winegar, president of the board of directors for Utah Water Wa-ter Resources and long-time expert on water useage in the state, said the original Smith-Morehouse Dam was in poor condition and would have had to be replaced within a few years. Although the dam is the most distant from the Weber Basin treatment treat-ment plant in Layton, the district's water system is set up to distribute water in any direction to any point within the district. Weber Basin has provided both culinary and (pressure) irrigation water to homes and businesses since the project was authorized by the federal government in 1949. It operates umder the authority of the U.S. Corps of Engineers. In addition to the newly acquired Smith-Morehouse Reservoir, Weber We-ber Basin's other major water sources iniclude East Canyon, Pineview, VVanship, Lost Creek and Causey Reservoirs and Willard Bay. |