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Show Two Hearings Dated on Rain Making Two public hearings will be held in Iron county next week to determine the reaction of local lo-cal people, particularly farmers and livestock men, toward the program of cloud seeding as a means of providing additional moisture for drought parched farm and range lands. Reports of a recent conference held at Richfield at which arguments argu-ments proving or disproving the silccess of cloud seeding as a means of creating additional rainfall, will be given at the hearings in Iron county, and general gen-eral discussions will take place. From the reaction of local residents resi-dents at the' hearings county representative will determine whether or not to favor a renewal re-newal of the contract with the "rain-making" firm for another year. The hearing in Parowan will be held at the courthouse on Monday evening, March 24. The (Continued oa Page Two) RAIN MAKING (Continued from Page One) Cedar City hearing will open at 8 p. m. Wednesday, March 26, in the ballroom of El Escalante hotel. Anyone interested in the rain-making program, directly or indirectly, is invited to attend either meeting and hear the reports re-ports and express opinion on the subject At the conference of the Southern South-ern Utah Water Resources Development De-velopment Corporation at Richfield, Rich-field, interesting facts were given giv-en by some of the top scientists in their field. Dr. Irving P. Krick, head of the WRDC, which inaugurated in-augurated the cloud seeding project pro-ject in southern Utah last year, asked for a renewal of the contract con-tract and claimed that the project pro-ject had increased moisture by approximately 61 per cent. He maintained that had not the project been undertaken an average av-erage of seven inches of moisture mois-ture would have fallen, whereas where-as at the present time 11.3 Inches Inch-es have been realized. He also estimated that the increase in moisture had meant an increase in production of at least $500,000 in crops. Other agencies, particularly the United States Weather Bu-rea, Bu-rea, maintained that there is nothing to substantiate the claim of increased moisture as a result re-sult of cloud seeding activities. No formal action was taken on the renewal of the contract for - cloud seeding, but rather representatives will meet again on March 29 to make a final decision on the proposal. The decision de-cision will be made in accordance accord-ance with the wishes of farmers farm-ers and livestock men expressed at hearings to be held throughout through-out the 14 counties covered by the present contract. Last year 13 counties paid Krick's firm a total of $88,000 for his rain-increasing attempts. Dr. Krick has indicated however, that he can proceed with the project during 1952 at a reduction reduc-tion in cost to the contributors. A final decision s to whether to accept or reject the new contract will be made at the meeting in Richfield March 29. Every Iron county resident interested in-terested in the rain-making program pro-gram is urged to attend one or the other of the hearings in Iron county, Monday evening in Par-owan Par-owan and Wednesday evening In Cedar City. |