Show SECRE SECRETARY TAny WORK AND AIND THE irrigation PROJECTS it does not happen very frequently that senators of 0 one political party give a glowing testimony of I 1 efficiency to a high office holder bolder of the other political party and be cause it ha happens haddeus so rarely it Is ia a so 0 much diore more significant when it hap pens an occurrence occur ence of such significance ance came about the other day alien when senator king democrat ot of e utah spoke words of praise for secretary of the interior dr work in connection with the secretary secre thoughts and actions regarding the irrigation projects secretary op of the interior work ihas has recommended that congress provide that the annual overhead costs of the main office of tile the bureau of reclamation at washington no longer be charged against tile water users of reclamation tion projects I 1 he points out in his communication that the reclamation law charges all of the general overhead ex geneses of the main office of the bureau of reclamation against the water users on various projects in 1923 this cost amounted to and since the beginning of the reclamation work it has haa aggregated gre gated the sum of secretary works letter Is addressed led to representative addison T smith republican of idaho ant and chairman of the house committee on irrigation irrig aaion and reclamation ren re presen dative smith is heartily in favor of the change in proposing the change secretary work said the department of agriculture is carried on for the benefit of the farmers the department of labor is conducted for the benefit of labor and so it is with other divisions of the government yet the special beneficiaries do not pay the costs of the offices the offices of the bureau of reclamation are we believe the only offices of the government the full costs of which are required to be repaid by the part particular class which receives special benefits if we eliminate a few organizations like the patent office which perform many small items of service for charges payable in advance in the case of federal Irrig irrigation irrigate ati on projects it appears to be the policy of the government to supply tho the appropriations for their construction at a slow rate with the result that thai the farmers under the projects ar I 1 compelled to carry a burden of overhead charged over an unnecessarily long period of time this burden would be equitably lightened if the catts ot of the washington office were charged to the reclamation fund but not to the water users on the projects the latter would still be obligated to pay a considerable amount of future overhead cost on account of other field offices and all past overhead cost on account of all the offices of the bureau |