State-Funded Irrigation Settlement Wins Legislative Backing
After overcoming Senate opposition, state land settlement project secures $50,000 in funding as settlers express guarded optimism about the program's future.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
Both the House and the Senate have passed the bill appropriating $50,000 for the state land settlement project in this valley, and advices from Olympia are that Governor Hartley will sign the measure. This $50,000 is intended for this year and is sufficient, Project Manager J. C. Scott says, to care for practically all the needs for that period. The House was overwhelmingly in favor of the appropriation, but some opposition developed in the Senate due to misinformation. This opposition was dissipated when J. C. Lloyd and his associates explained the facts to the Senate appropriation committee. In spite of the adverse conditions of the farming business over the last few years and the fact that new settlers were pioneering on raw, unimproved land, a great majority of the settlers are satisfied with the project and the way the land settlement law has been administered. It is true some minor mistakes have been made, but considering this is the state's maiden effort in land settlement, the results have been remarkable.
“In spite of the adverse conditions of the whole farming business all over the country... it is a fact easily ascertainable that a great majority of the settlers are satisfied.”
The struggle to balance the high costs of irrigation against the viability of small-scale farming remains a constant theme in the arid climate of the Columbia Basin. While the state-funded project of 1925 has long since passed into history, modern growers in the White Bluffs area still grapple with the legacy of water rights and the economic sustainability of the land.
From readers
No comments yet. If you know something about this story — a correction, a family memory, a source — it belongs here.