This project of New York City constituted the first important case to come before the Water Supply Commission for its official approval. After extended and careful consideration of all the manifold interests involved in this remarkable project, and after a protracted series of hearings, the suggestions of the Commission with regard to the protection of the rights of all the other municipalities and people affected were incorporated into law, and the project received the sanction of the Commission. Under the authority thus given New York City has entered upon its work of constructing the most pretentious municipal water-supply system in the United States.
Subsequent to the New York City petition, many other applications from villages and cities, large and small, have been passed upon. By the accumulation of special knowledge resulting from comparing the problems of different localities, the Commission has been able to bring to the aid of the smaller communities of the State a fund of experience and counsel which in not a few instances has proved of great benefit and assistance. The Commission aims to make its practice simple, expeditious, and inexpensive; and the technical points involved in each application are carefully passed upon by a competent engineer.
A complete census of all existing water supply plants and systems has been made and is revised from time to time, and the progress of each applicant whose plans are approved is carefully followed. Construction work involving expenditures of $230,000,000 has been passed upon by the Commission and undertaken by the municipalities of the State. This has entailed the official consideration by the Commission of 85 separate applications, in connection with each of which public hearings are conducted.
Numerous complaints have been filed with the Commission alleging unsatisfactory domestic or fire service both on the part of municipalities and water companies. The source of dissatisfaction seems to be the lack of foresight on the part of the municipal or water company officials, as a result of which they have obtained an inadequate supply or insufficient pressure. There are many instances of this condition in the State. There are also many consumers who object to excessive rates which they claim are imposed upon them by water companies. On the other hand, some of the companies themselves have attempted to secure legislation to provide that the State shall be the arbitrator in the adjustment of water rates. These conditions seem to point to the conclusion that in the comparatively near future the State will have to assume control over these matters. A certain degree of this sort of control is exercised in an indirect way at present in the case of applications which are before the Commission for consideration, but no jurisdiction lies with the Commission unless the acquisition of lands for a new or additional source of supply is involved.
River Improvement for Health and Safety
A number of river-improvement petitions presented to the River Improvement Commission and still pending at the time that Commission's powers were transferred to the Water Supply Commission involved the construction of storage reservoirs in the Adirondack forests. The River Improvement Commission had considered the constitutional questions involved in the utilization of State forest lands for storage reservoir purposes, and had reached the conclusion that the force of a clause in the Constitution prohibiting the removal of timber was paramount to all exercise of the police authority of the State to protect the public health and safety; and it had declined further to consider any petitions involving the utilization of State forest lands for reservoir purposes. The Water Supply Commission on the other hand has held that the statutes relating to river improvements in the interest of the public health and safety are not sufficiently comprehensive to afford a proper basis on which to advance systematic water conservation involving water-powers. The existing river improvement law has the health and safety element as its basis, whereas the carrying out of a comprehensive conservation policy would be of greatest financial value to the existing and new power developments, owing to the regulating effect of storage reservoirs on the flow of the streams. For this reason the Water Supply Commission has not urged the execution of river improvement projects involving water storage, under existing statutes, and has recommended to the Legislature that the advancement of such projects should await the determination of a definite State policy and the formulation of a thoroughly comprehensive plan by means of which the storage reservoirs shall constitute a source of income to the State, even after the bonds are retired. Several projected improvements therefore await the enactment of a more suitable statute.
Meantime, however, an important project calling for rather different treatment had arisen in the proposed improvement of the Canaseraga creek, the most important tributary of Genesee river. This project originated with the River Improvement Commission, and the Water Supply Commission inherited and actively carried on the consideration of the problems involved. For the last 22 miles of its course this creek flows through a broad, fertile valley. Owing to the steep declivities of the upper water-shed and the resulting suddenness and severity of floods in the valley, a large portion of these flat lands were submerged two or three times a year, and the channel had gradually become filled with silt which raised the prism to such a height that the stream itself and its banks were actually higher in places than the adjacent land. In times of flood the stream overflowed and the water would stand for several days at a time over the low areas, in a large measure destroying such crops as were in a growing condition and effectually deterring the farmers from cultivating the lands thoroughly and systematically. The project of improvement which, after due course of public hearings and consideration by the Water Supply Commission received the official approval of the Legislature, contemplates the straightening, widening, and deepening of the channel of the stream, so as to afford a much more capacious flood prism and to shorten the length of the stream through the flooded district by about six miles. At the same time lateral ditches are proposed to be constructed to carry off the overflowing waters from the lower adjacent lands in order to protect them permanently from any serious or protracted inundation.
This project did not involve the use of any State forest lands, nor did it affect any water-power developments. The fact was readily established that the proposed improvement was of great importance to the public health and safety of the community, and also of great importance, from a financial point of view, to the prosperity and general welfare of the community on account of the benefits that would accrue to agriculturists from the protection to be afforded by the proposed improvements against flood damages. The machinery involved in the working out of the project was put in operation and from time to time various obstacles were encountered which had to be surmounted by amending the law. Gradually the statute has been so moulded that it is now thought to be in practical working order, and the proposed Canaseraga creek improvement is actually provided for and financed; the bonds having been sold at a good premium. The actual work of the construction of the proposed improvement will probably be begun in the near future.
The practicability of the method having thus been established the Water Supply Commission believes that the State now has a method by which floods may be mitigated if there are no water-powers or State forest lands involved. On the other hand, the solution of the problem where these complications do exist, is much more difficult. In the cases of the Genesee, Hudson, and Raquette rivers, petitions for the improvement of which have been filed under the public health and safety statute, very little real relief can be afforded by straightening or enlarging the channels of the streams. Water storage appears to be the only practicable solution, and the water-powers which would be improved could afford to bear a larger share of the cost of improvement than those who would benefit from flood control.