every day that the river is at its height, or from the time it gets near the top of the bank, they have to begin dumping rock along that entire levee-10 miles [indicating on map.]

Mr. SWING. Will you state whether or not Laguna Dam exercises any flood control or has any storage possibilities whatever?

Mr. FLY. Absolutely none at all; it is simply a diversion dam; and it raises the water 10 feet above its original height. Laguna Damthat is a misnomer. That does not hold any water at all. The stream all the way through is full of silt. It does not store a drop of water. Now, we are always in danger of the river eating into its bank on the California side; and if it does that it immediately destroys our canal here [indicating], which is the siphon canal, bringing the water down to Yuma Project, following the red line down to this little black line [indicating], and coming on here [indicating] and passing down under the river, in an inverted siphon, in a reinforced concrete pipe--you might call it either 16 or 14 feet in diameter, capable of conveying, I think, 1,600 cubic feet of water a second; is that not correct, Mr. Davis? It is something like that. Or enough water, at any rate, coming through that siphon to irrigate all of Yuma Valley and 45,000 acres on the Mesa here [indicating], that is considered inside of the project, but a separate division of the project proper.

Now, let me repeat that again: As long as this river continues to flow unchecked as it does, we are in great danger of the river breaking its banks here [indicating on map] and destroying our canals here [indicating]; and if that is broken-even if our levees here [indicating] do not break, why, we are denied water until that is constructed.

Mr. HUDSPETH. Will you permit a question at this point, Colonel Fly?

Mr. FLY. Yes, sir.

Mr. HUDSPETH. Are the lands embraced in the Yuma project now or will they be obligated to pay any portion of the cost of the allAmerican canal?

Mr. FLY. Not a particle.

Mr. HUDSPETH. Why not, Colonel Fly?

Mr. FLY. Because that is not on our side of the river. We have built our canal.

Mr. HUDSPETH. I understand; but if the canal is built, you will reap a great benefit from the building of the canal, according to your statement?

Mr. FLY. No: but we are not chargeable with anything. The Imperial Valley does not want to charge us anything.

Mr. HUDSPETH. They are quite liberal people over there, and they are willing to pay for the whole proposition?

Mr. SWING. Colonel Fly and the other men over in Yuma Valley were such severe negotiators that they forced Imperial Valley to make a contract-which, I think, is to their credit-that requires us to pay for that.

Mr. HUDSPETH. In other words, they are good people?

Mr. SWING. They have demonstrated that.

Mr. LEATHERWOOD. Why should you not, as a moral proposition, bear your proportion of that expense?

Mr. FLY. I would not like to go into the moral aspect of it because that goes so far.

Mr. HAYDEN. The Yuma reclamation project was constructed by the United States Government. The project has vested rights to water from the Colorado River. It is a completed project, a going concern; and it is totally unnecessary, so far as the Yuma project is concerned, to build the all-American canal. But being menaced by the weir which Colonel Fly has mentioned, the people of Yuma project very properly took steps to protect themselves. They entered into negotiations with the Imperial irrigation district, by which it was agreed that that district would abandon that weir and make connection above with the Laguna Dam. There is no moral or legal obligation of any kind resting on the people of Yuma project to pay any part of the cost of the all-American canal.

Mr. HUDSPETH. But, Mr. Hayden, there is a great danger, a continuous danger, existing at all times now by reason of the nonconstruction of the all-American canal?

Mr. HAYDEN. As I have just pointed out in the question I asked Colonel Fly, the all-American canal through the sand hills would do them no good. The entire benefit that could be conferred upon the Yuma project could be accomplished by the extension of the canal from the Laguna Dam down to the Mexican boundary line, thereby removing the necessity for the maintenance of any kind of weir in the stream opposite the Yuma levee. All of that could be accomplished by going that far. The further benefit to the Imperial Valley by the construction of the all-American canal is their affair in which the Yuma project is not interested.

Mr. HUDSPETH. But it would relieve you, according to Colonel Fly's statement, of putting in that 6,480 miles of rock, as I figure it, that has been deposited there for the protection of that land?

Mr. HAYDEN. That could be taken care of by constructing what has been called the "first leg" of the all-American canal. The only way that Yuma can be protected from the flood menace is by the construction of a great dam in the canyon of the Colorado River.

Mr. SWING. The rock referred to by Colonel Fly was rock dumped by Imperial Valley into the river itself each year, to construct a temporary diversion dam, which, as soon as the low season was passed, we tried to blow out with dynamite.

Mr. HUDSPETH. But, Mr. Swing, there is no question now but what there is a great menace against the lands in the Yuma Valley? Mr. SWING. I will let Colonel Fly answer that.

The CHAIRMAN. He has already stated that.

Mr. HUDSPETH. And the construction of the all-American canal will remove that?

Mr. SWING. No; the construction of the dam.

Mr. HAYDEN. The construction of the all-American canal will not remove that menace to the Yuma project.

Mr. HUDSPETH. I had the impression that it was the construction of the all-American canal which would take away that seepage? Mr. HAYDEN. But the floods of the Colorado River will come down just the same, and the Yuma project must continue to maintain the levees.

Mr. HUDSPETH. But not to the same extent; you could divert a great deal of water through this all-American canal?

Mr. HAYDEN. Such a tremendous volume of water comes down the Colorado River that no canal can carry it.

Mr. FLY. The water going down the all-American canal would be just a drop in the bucket; you would not know it was being taken out of the river. But the all-American canal would be a great benefit to the Imperial irrigation district.

Mr. HUDSPETH. So that, in order to give you absolutely permanent relief, the Boulder Canyon Dam must be constructed?

Mr. FLY. Absolutely; and unless the Boulder Dam is constructed. it is only a matter of a few years; and I say now-I warn you gentlemen now, that I have my serious doubts as to whether the Imperial Valley can withstand another 10 years before she is completely annihilated, because this river flowing down here [indicating on map]-and I am familiar with every foot of this land from here [indicating] to there [indicating]. I have walked over it; I have gone over it as much as I could in automobiles; I have gone over it on horseback, and in every other way possible, and I am familiar with every foot of that land.

And I know that this is so certainly building up here [indicating on map] from the overflowed water, building a cone there [indicating], if you please, and back, where the water of the river is much higher than the land on either side of the levee that you are going to get an extraordinary flood there at some time, when the Gila and the Colorado Rivers come down together, for instance; and if such a calamity should ever occur, all the money in the Federal Treasury could not prevent that river from breaking over into Imperial Valley; and with that tremendous flow in the river at that time, I doubt if you have got forces enough in the United States to stop it until this erosion that I spoke of would come back and destroy the Laguna Dam and make Yuma high and dry.

Mr. LEATHERWOOD. Colonel, I take it that, before the hand of man constructed any artificial instrumentality along or about the river there, there was a menace to Yuma Valley from the river?

Mr. FLY. There was nothing there to menace; there was nothing there but rattlesnakes and Gila monsters and horned toads and things like that.

Mr. LEATHERWOOD. I think you understand what I mean: The river would inundate that section of the country?

Mr. FLY. It did every year.

Mr. LEATHERWOOD. So we can drop the rattlesnakes and the toads out from consideration at this time?

Mr. SWING. Now, you take the Colorado River from the Arizona boundary line, and running north for about 20 miles, there is a hog back, so to speak, is there not, Colonel Fly, so that part of Yuma Valley is lower than the river bed? Is there not a slope from the river into Yuma Valley?

Mr. FLY. Yes; the highest point along the river in the Yuma Valley is right along the edge of the river bank.

Mr. SWING. And where is the lowest point?

Mr. FLY. It then slopes back to about the middle of the valley; and it slopes from the mesa to about the middle [indicating on map]: there is a natural drain: the old settlers used to claim that the river came down this way [indicating] in the old days.

Mr. SWING. Through Yuma Valley?

Mr. FLY. Through Yuma Valley. Now, the earliest irrigation in Yuma Valley was that near the river at this point [indicating], known as the Ludy irrigation system. We now have a drain beginning here indicating and going up through the valley, with a branch here [indicating] and a branch there [indicating], to drain out all the seepage water in the valley.

At overflow periods the water seeping in through the banks makes that carry quite a large volume of water; the natural volume taken from there [indicating], and I maintain always coming in here first | indicating], because of this 4-foot rise of that diversion dam keeps the water level very much higher at all times than it naturally should be.

Mr. LEATHERWOOD. Let me ask you a question right there. Where is this diversion?

Mr. FLY. At that point [indicating] about 6 miles below Yuma. Mr. LEATHERWOOD. I wish you would make it clear to me at least what effect that diversion dam has on seepage below the dam? Mr. FLY. It does not have any effect below the dam.

Mr. LEATHERWOOD. Well, you have seepage down along there, you

say?

Mr. FLY. I am trying to make it clear to you that this [indicating on map] is a 4-foot elevation in the river-a dam 4 feet high.

Mr. LEATHERWOOD. I understand that perfectly; but from the place where pointer is now resting on the map on down in a general southerly direction you have seepage there in the river, have you not?

Mr. FLY. I doubt if there is any there from the river, except at high-water times.

Mr. LEATHERWOOD. You said a moment ago that there was seepage into that land?

Mr. FLY. I am trying to explain to you that it comes into this 6mile stretch [indicating].

Mr. LEATHERWOOD. Yes; but I notice after you stated that you went north from that point with your pointer. But is there any seepage from there down the river!

Mr. FLY. Not at low stage.

Mr. LEATHERWOOD. But at high stage?

Mr. FLY. When the river is high, of course there is.

Mr. LEATHERWOOD. NOW, what effect does that dam have on the seepage below the dam?

Mr. FLY. None whatever-except that there would not be that seepage above there [indicating].

Mr. LEATHERWOOD. That seepage is above; that is your contention, is it not?

Mr. FLY. Yes, sir.

Mr. LEATHERWOOD. What about the seepage below you?

Mr. FLY. That does not bother us. Yuma is not complaining of that at all.

Mr. HAYDEN. Is it not true that by reason of the fact that the United States Reclamation Service levee was built on the Arizona side of the river before any levees were built on the Mexican or Lower California side, when the floods came under those conditions the

water was prevented from entering the Yuma project, but was permitted to spread itself over the country?

Mr. FLY. On the Mexican side.

Mr. HAYDEN. On the Mexican side, or the Lower California side. By the construction of the levees on the Mexican side of the river it has been necessary to raise the levees on the American side and strengthen them.

Mr. FLY. Absolutely. The Government of the United States went down into the Republic of Mexico and spent a million dollars in constructing this levee known as the Ockerson Levee.

Mr. LEATHERWOOD. Who paid for that?

Mr. FLY. The United States Government paid for that.

Mr. LEATHERWOOD. That was not reimbursable?

Mr. FLY. I think not.

Mr. LEATHERWOOD. Now, what was the obligation of the Imperial Valley to you people under your existing arrangement?

Mr. FLY. Under our existing arrangement we had a preferential right, you might call it, for the diversion of enough water here [indicating] to irrigate 120,000 acres.

Mr. LEATHERWOOD. No: I mean with reference to protection: you. perhaps, misunderstood me.

Mr. FLY. Perhaps so.

Mr. LEATHERWOOD. I understood you earlier in your statement to say that Imperial Valley has undertaken, by some sort of arrangement, to protect you-and by that I mean the people of the Yuma project against the seepage in the area above the present siteMr. FLY (interposing). There is nothing about seepage in the

contract.

Mr. LEATHERWOOD (continuing). The present site of the diversion dam.

Mr. FLY. There is nothing about seepage. If I said that, I did not mean to do so. Here is what I think I said: That we have from the Imperial Valley a half a million dollar bond to the effect that if the diversion dam hurts us, or if there is trouble down there and Imperial Valley does not take that diversion dam out, and that causes our levee to break, we hold her responsible for that half a million dollars. Mr. LEATHERWOOD. In other words, they have simply put in a levee there?

Mr. FLY. Not a levee-a dam,

Mr. LEATHERWOOD. Well, then, this bond that they have given guarantees you against your levee breaking; and if it breaks they have to reimburse you?

Mr. FLY. Yes, sir.

Mr. LEATHERWOOD. Then I ask you again, if the people of the United States come in there and take charge of this whole situation. why should not the Yuma Valley contribute its share?

Mr. FLY. Well, we are contributing for our full share of everything that has been done. The Government has us under bond for every acre of land; we have a mortgage on our lands; we are paying our full share; we are a going concern there.

Mr. LEATHERWOOD. I do not quite get your position as to why the entire burden of solving permanently this problem should be shifted from you over to the Imperial Valley?