Show Report favorable for Water Planning Act WASHINGTON The Senate Interior Committee today reported favorably the Water Resources Planning Act and also attached an amendment submitted by Senator Wallace F. Bennett safeguarding the autonomy of the Upper Colorado River The bill would provide for the optimum development of the Nation's natural resources through the coordinated planning of water and related land through the establishment of a water resource council and river basin It also would provide financial assistance to the States in order to increase State participation in any such The amendment which was submitted by Senator Bennett at request of the Upper Colorado River Commission to Senator Clinton P. chief sponsor of the would the autonomy of the Upper Colorado River Commission and also protect the Compact commitments arrived at on the Colorado In affect the amendment would provide that the Upper Colorado River Basin would be treated as a separate Language protecting the Upper Colorado Basin was in the original bill which passed the Senate in the it was deleted in the House version of the proposal due to a Senator Bennett over-all conditions in the Colorado River Basin arc unique when compared with other river basins In the Senator Bennett interstate compact has apportioned the water of the river system between the Upper Basin and the Lower Basin in such a way that each for all practical Is a river within Senator Bennett and other conditions within the Colorado River Basin also effectively divide the two basins into two sub-basins so far as water resources planning and development are he river basin such as that proposed In the Anderson should recognize the specific terms of existing compacts which subdivided the two |