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Show Under The Capitol Dome By Harry Marlowe There are a pair of old axioms which state, "Better late than never,, and "The race is not always al-ways to the swifty." If the Upper Basin states hope to get authorization of the vitally-needed vitally-needed Colorado River project, these axioms had better be true I and applicable in this case. In Salt Lake City recently, Utah, 1 Wyoming, Colorado and New Mexico got together to do something some-thing which should have been done at least three years ago organize a "grass roots" committee, commit-tee, with some finances, to push for authorization of the project. This citizen's committee is organized or-ganized to "tell the public the real story of the Upper Colorado River development." And, there is no doubt this committee will do a good job. There isn't much doubt they will be able to raise at least the $100,000 fund they are aiming at. But, can this group undo the prejudices built up, particularly against the Echo Park Dam, by wide-awake conservationists (also obstructionist) interests who were getting body punches while the upper basin battlers were still in their corners waiting for the bell. An impression has been built up throughout the eastern United States that construction of Echo Park dam will in some way open the flood gates to dam in every national park. Easterners are convinced that valuable dinosaur bones will be covered, "some of the most beautiful beaut-iful scenery in the world" will be i ruined, and that there are "any number of alternate sites as good as Echo." These citizens have that impression impres-sion because California's Sierra Club, many and varied conservation conserva-tion outfits and several other organizations or-ganizations have spent some $350,-000 $350,-000 to convince the public this was true. While that was going on, the people in Utah were appraised of the truth, most of the other Upper Basin people had an idea of what was going on, hundreds of thousands thous-ands of letters poured in to Congressmen Con-gressmen condemning the project, and upper basin solons couldn't get over a handful of letters from the four states most concerned. That will change this year. This idea of the "Acqualante" giving a dollar to an organization to protect pro-tect the vital water interests of four states The idea has appeal, and the plans of the organization good. They will go a long way to arouse public interests. They will also mean that a great many people in the Upper Basin, besides contributing a little money to the war chest, will get all the information about the whole project, information needed if intelligent appeals can be made as they must be from at least 100,000 people in the four states to the members of Congress. For once, the four upper basin states are united on the fact that this is a good idea. Utah is already al-ready organized ready to push the plan, Wyoming is ready, Colorado Col-orado and New Mexico will be. Let's hope that this isn't another an-other case of locking the corral gate after the water trough has already been emptied by the neighbor's cow. |