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V Las Vegas - November 10, 1944 (Personal) Mr. W. U. Jeffers: Referring to telephone conversation date with Mr. Cope regarding discussion of the water situation here with the Chamber of Commerce ivovember 5. 1 understand Mr. Guild furnished you with details under date of November 6, and Mr. Strong sent me copy of his letter November 7 to Mr. Ashby, which contains a very good report of the discussion at the meeting. However I wished to advise you the background and. reason for the meeting, and that is to make the public conscious of the necessity for conserving the under­ground water supply in this basin. In 1940 we discussed #ith the State Engineer the possibility of seriously de­pleting the supply of underground water by promiscuous issuance of drilling permits in the Lae Vegas Valley where more than 400 welle now exist. He advised that the policy of hie office was to issue permits, and in the absence of any protest he had in fact no other course. However recognizing the seriousness of the threat to the underground supply, he suggested the organ­ization of a Water Conservation District in this Valley. This was done and the,City of Las Vegas, County of Clark and our Company became members. A water Supervisor was employed, working under the direction of the State Engi­neer and his salary was paid through donations fro® the above named members until such time as authority could be received to pay hi® from the State Tax Payroll. He is so employed at present and his duties are to close in those wells which are not being put to beneficial use. In May of this year we m t e d an unusual decline In the production of our wells, and af the same time two of the land owners located in the immediate vicinity of the water supply filed an application to drill an additional well on their land. We felt that this would deplete the supply of water to the Railroad and City, and therefore filed a protest with the State Engineer. The two land owners above referred to were members of the local Chamber of Commerce and felt that we were trying to monopolize the water in the underground channel. 2019-02-25 2019-02-25 http://cdm17304.contentdm.oclc.org/cdm/ref/collection/p17304coll5/id/53… 53253 53254.pdfpage /p17304coll5/image/53254.pdfpage