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City To Offer Rebuffed in their efforts td negotiate a contract for water from the Lake Mead-Basic pipeline, members of the Las i Vegas Water district came out I swinging last night and de- ; mantled the replacement of iJohn Mueller, special repre­sentative of the General Serv- • ices Administration, with a full-time employee of the fed­eral agency. As the water district criticism of the rebuke handed them on Tuesday by the four major les-j sees at the Basic Magnesium plant when the operating firms i declined to approve the district’s I petition for service from the pipe- I line became known late in the day, district officials were swamped with pledges of coop* j eration and support of the “wa- | ter cause.” ! Among the pledges of cooper­ation was one voted by the city I commissioners of Las Vegas last night who announced plans of notifying the water district di­rectors that the community will j help in the program to secure more water for Las Vegas. The ; moton for a- letter to be sent j to the district was introduced by Commissioner Wendell Bun­ker and seconded by Commis­sioner William Peccole. In submitting the motion, Bunker warned of an impend* ing shortage of water not only I for the pity but the entire val- 1 ley next year. Mayor Baker, | while supporting the resolu-j (ion, pointed out that he be­lieved that the only perma­nent solution to the valley’s water problem would be for the district to develop an inde- 1 pendent supply of water from | i.nirn Mead without depending upon the Basic pipeline- Baker expressed the opinion that he did not see how it whs possible for the water district to attempt to “get something for ; nothing.” He referred to the dis­trict’s proposal to obtain, the fa­cility for a nominal pttce and then floating a bond issue fb p u r ­chase the Las Vegas Land and Water’ Co.’s .services' here and other facilities. Peccole said he favored the transmission of tele­grams to Nevada’s congressional delegation containing “ten thous­and” signatures if necessary, to impress upon government lead­ers the imperative interest the local residents have in the pro­curing of^ a Lake .Mead water | source. i “1 would like to see a 150 foot telegram sent to the mem- , bers of the delegation, if such is necessary,” Peccole said. Although. Mueller was not [named directly in the scathing i statement by district board mem-j bers, the inference was there and it was easy to pick out who.! I the “part time” GSA employe is.j I Governor Russell also came ini It for mention.in the statement asj the board requested the governor! I [ to make a definite statement and; j make it known >to the GSA and to' j the public concerning the cthrent 1 problem. In Carson City, the office of j Governor Russell said that the I chief executive has been informed! | J of the rejection by the plant les-| sees of the water district’s pro-) gram but that Russell, who is j still in Canada attending a meet-1 j ing of the Three Flags Highway association, has not made known his thoughts concerning the prob- I lem. The governor’s office said also i that nothing further has devel- | oped nor has “anything what­ever” been heard from Mueller I who is in Washington, about the I new contract which was mailed I to him last weekend. The new contract, however, apparently will not be approved by GSA in view of the negative action taken Tues­day by the plant lessees. In addition to seeking Muel- j jler’s ouster, district members! asked answers to the following jquestions: , “1. Who is currently in charge of the General Services Adminis­tration? Now that Col. Jess Lar­son, former administrator of Las Vegas Morning GSA, has been appointed to a new governmental position, to whom must the Colorado' River Commission and the District look for its answers, upon which the future development and fate of j the Las Vegas Valley depends? “2. W hy cannot the General i Services Administration immedi- j ately dispatch to Las Vegas quali­fied and authorized full-time rep- • 1 resentatives, with full authority ! to consummate this matter lo- j cally, where the voice of the pub- j lie may be heard more distinctly than in Washington? “3. Has not the time come for ? Gov. Charles Russell, who is also 1 chairman of the Colorado River 1 Commission, to make a definite I statement and make it known to the General Services Adminis- ‘ tration and the public? “4. What has occurred to so | completely change the initial un­derstanding that the General Services Administration would transfer Basic Magnesium water facilities to the water district for one dollar, allowing appro- I priate credit to the River Com- i mission for this concession? What j has held up this transfer, which our senior sehator said last week in a letter to the Chamber of i Commere should have been con-1; summated long ago?” An interpretation, of the water district’s statement made it plain that members were not directing their criticism against any indi- I vidu'al named in the statement 1 such as Governor Russell, Sen­* I Sun-August 16, 1951 ator McCarran, Larsen, or Muel­ler, but against all the agencies, either government, state or pri- I vate, who have had a hand in creating what they term, the • i present stalemate. Because the plant lessees yes­terday rejected the contract which had been previously'tenta- I tively approved by all parties, in­cluding the general services ad­ministration, water district mem­bers said the burden of imme-1 diately formulating and coming; forward with a counter-proposal ! acceptable to all parties rested ; squarely on the shoulders of the Tour lessees, Western Electric Chemical Company; S t a u f f e r Chemical C o m p a n y ; United i States Titanium and U. S. Lime Products.