Consumers Ditch Company Shifts Land Policy Amid War Food Demands
Facing mounting pressure, the irrigation company abandons its restrictive policy to lease land for merely taxes and water maintenance.
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Charles M. Sanford, manager of the Consumers Ditch company, says that his company will lease any of its unsold lands where the cost of new laterals is not too great, to anyone for only the taxes and water maintenance. For the first year, or such time as it takes to get the alfalfa or other crops started, the company will furnish all the water needed for the contract price of $4.80 per acre. This innovation is a departure from the policy of the company since the power interests got control of the Hanford company several years ago, and the decision was no doubt influenced by the war situation and the general demand for increased food production.
“This innovation is a departure from the policy of the company since the power interests got control of the Hanford company.”
This reflects the historic fragility of irrigation-dependent agriculture in the Benton County region. It marks a moment where private land ownership policies were forced to bend to public necessity—a conflict that defined the development of the Columbia Basin.
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