Water Resources People and Issues
Q: Were you involved in some of this early work of the Senate Select
Committee?
A: Yes, I was.
Q: Can you explain how?
A: I was drawn in as a consultant. Ted Schad was in charge of the staff, and I
remember talking with Senator Kerr and others who had their own private
agendas of what they wanted to come out of the Senate Select Committee. I
was interested in seeing that the TVA had a chance to state what its
experience had been in efforts of floodplain management and also in getting
the Corps to express its view of what it saw happening in the field. I did
have a hand in one draft of the final report of the Senate Select Committee.
Q: Do you recollect what some of the major points of that report were?
A: It was transmitted on January 30, 1961, with a large number of appendices.
It recommended, among other things, completing basin-wide studies, a grants
program to the states for water planning, a scientific research program on
water, a biennial national water assessment, and four steps to enhance water
efficiency, including regulation of floodplain use and delineation of flood
hazard areas.
Q: Okay. Soon after Kennedy took office he asked his various cabinet secretaries
who were involved with water resources to come up with a new plan for
coordinated development, and out of that comes Senate Document 97. Were
you involved with that effort at all?
A: Yes, I was. Again on the periphery. I was involved in making comments
about it at different stages, but I didn`t have a major drafting responsibility.
Q: There was, as I recall, in that report some mention of a nonstructural
approach.
A: Yes.
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