upr000026 36

L a s V e g a s ,N e v a d a REVIEW - JOURNAL May 6 , 1 9 ^ New Fight Flares Over Proposed Wafer District Controversy over the proposed establishment of a Moapa valley i water district flared on a new front yesterday when a group of land owners in the Overton- Logandale district filed an in-1 Junction complaint in district court against further action by the county commissioners on the improvement program. Plaintiffs named in the com­plaint included Mads Jorgenson, John F. Lewis, Edwin Marshall and J. Reuben Whipple. Defend­ants are County Commissioners Frank Gusewelle, Rodney Colton and M. E. Leavitt and County Clerk Gertrude Moore. The complaint charged that a petition filed in opposition to the original petition, calling for an election for establishment of the water district, and signed by in* terested taxpayers and property owners, had been improperly ex­cluded from consideration by the commissioners and that no with­drawal of names on the original petition had been allowed. Procedure for the initiation of the water district was further cited as legally defective because “lands in Moapa valley were ar­bitrarily excluded for die purpose of forestalling opposition to the project.” ijtis was not in accordance with Nevada statutes, the com­plaint stated, which holds that *‘a majority of the land holders benefited may propose organiza­tion of k local improvement dis­trict.” . It was also charged that no map showing the proposed boundaries of the water district was attach­ed to the original petition when it was circulated and that the pe­tition was defective because none of the signatures had been au- 1 thenticated. % :< The assessment of one dollar j per acre for"organization expense i j involved in setting up the district, ; and the twenty cents per acre : operating expense thereafter, \ was also branded as ‘‘unreason- . able and unjust.” It was also charged that the qualified electors in the district, i j in event that the election was j j carried out, included a great ma- 1 j jority of persons owning little or * j no, real property in the area and ! I' therefore not liable to carry the 1 ! tax burden which would ensue. | Property within the district, !} ; the opposition stated, was already i taxed to the full limit, eliminat­ing the possibility of a success­ful bond issue. Any attempt to | 'circulate or sell bonds for the : project could be enjoined and re- I strained, they said. 1 The group held further that a current survey being carried on by the bureau of reclamation for the possible establishment of a conservation and flood control program in the area indicated the intention of the government to set up such a program. The ! establishment of a county water i district would hinder the incep­tion of any such program under the auspices of the U. S- govern- | ment, they asserted. A court order issuing a pre- 1 liminary and temporary injunc- j tion against further election pro* ! cedure by the county commission­ers was given yesterday by Dis- i trict Judge A. S. Henderson pending a hearing on the injunc­tion complaint ?o-