r
Weather
Overcast mornings and
mostly cloudy afternoons
Friday and Saturday with
30 per cent chance rain
both afternoons. High
Mid-80s. Low tonight 71.
SE winds 10-16 mph.
Cbe Battalion
Inside
Book Mart p. 3
Fish pond p. 3
Track meet p. 6
Vol. 68 No. 115
College Station, Texas
Friday, May 2, 1975
W-1 Girls Hit Obstacle Course
Being equal to the men is not always a bed
of roses, and the women in the W-1 outfit
of the Corps are finding it out. Waggie Win
nie Jackson seems to be taking it all in stride,
however, as she swings down some bars on
the Corps obstacle course.
TAMU spending criticized
HEW audit reviewed
By KARLA MOURITSEN
Staff Writer
The Academic Council meeting
was highlighted by a report by Ex
ecutive Vice President Administra
tion Clyde Freeman on a federal
audit of the university.
The meeting was opened by Pres
ident Jack Williams who displayed a
subtle sense of humor with several
one-liners about the new Board of
Directors headquarters. He told all
of the faculty members that aspired
to be on the board that their new
home “is a nice place.’ “In fact,”
quipped Williams, “since we built
the new board house, students have
been quite active in trying to get on
the board.” Williams was referring
to the efforts of the Student Gov
ernment to get an ex-officio student
member on the Board of Directors.
Student senate elections ended
today with 18 candidates chosen in
five races.
In the 12-place off-campus un
dergraduate race Mike Garrett,
Karen Gilmer and Kay Zenner were
elected. Others elected in the race
were Jimmy Arnold, David Hill, Joy
Drummond, Jess Pettit and Steve
Ingram. Also, Debbie Boyd, Joanne
Arnold, Dick White and Brad
Brown were chosen.
One candidate, Jim James was
Freeman reported on the results
of an audit by the Department of
Health, Education, and Welfare
from December of 1972 to March of
1974. The purpose of the audit was
to review the management of the
university and he waited to present
his report “until my blood pressure
went down.”
The nine-member HEW team
reported to the National Institute of
Health Audits Resolution Branch in
Bethesda, Md. The recommenda
tions were then forwarded to the
university.
The team’s report stated that
there was an absence of knowledge
able monthly reviews of labor dis
tribution by responsible adminis
trators. They claimed that A&M
should repay $5.9 million that had
been received in federal funds.
disqualified for illegal campaigning.
In other races Raymond DuBois
was elected senator from Milner,
Legett, Hotard and Walton. Kin
Bush and Tom Kollaja were elected
from the College of Architecture
and Environmental Design.
In the senate race for seats from
the College of Agriculture, Bryan
Crittendon and Gregg Parks were
chosen. In the fifth race for a senate
seat in the College of Education
Mike Forehand was elected over
three opponents.
Negotiations then began between
the university and the government,
with the university hoping to have
the claim withdrawn should it meet
certain guidelines. These included
having the department head sign
the payroll at the end of the month
and having him certify that he
knows of the work done by each in
dividual. Also, the university has to
start a system of internal auditing of
the payrolls.
The second complaint that the
HEW team registered against A&M
was that the property management
system needed to be improved.
A&M agreed to check each
department’s inventory and to get
the campus security to investigate
any missing materials.
Another system that the HEW
criticized was the university’s prac
tice of making an estimate of how
much federal money that it would
need for the month and applying for
a letter of credit. This sometimes
led to deficits or excesses in the ac
count, so the government will now
supply the money on a daily basis.
The report said that $14,400 were
spent without the federal agency’s
written approval in advance. It was
therefore requested that the
$14,400 be returned, but the back
ground information was submitted
on the expenditures, and the agency
resubmitted a claim of $4,400. This
is still being appealed.
Finally, the agency found that
over the last six years the computer
facility had incurred a deficit of over
$41,000. It was suggested that the
program be readjusted, but the
HEW team couldn’t supply a cost
analysis for the computers either.
That issue is at a standoff.
Freeman said, “Federal in
volvement is increasing at an alarm
ing rate.” He predicted “more pre
cise requirements for federally
sponsored programs, a campus
wide energy conservation program
dictated by the federal government,
more precise manpower require
ments and an attempt to limit the
see Academic, page 3
Jaworski
to speak
Tuesday
Houston Attorney Leon Jaworski
will speak here Tuesday in obser
vance of Law Day.
The Memorial Student Center,
the Political Forum Committee,
and the Brazos County Bar Associa
tion are cooperating in the presenta
tion.
Planned for 8 p.m. Tuesday in the
Rudder Auditorium, the Jaworski
address will be a public-free event.
Jaworski is a nationally-known at
torney and was special Watergate
prosecutor, appointed by the Acting
Attorney General Robert Bork in
November, 1973, after Archibald
Cox was dismissed.
Law Day was established by act ol
Congress and stresses citizen rec
ognition of equality and justice
under law. The Brazos Bar Associa
tion also will recognize Tuesday as
Law Day.
18 senators chosen
as five races end
Millican dam: history vs. current status
Benefits and drawbacks
Congress hears both sides of issue
By ROD SPEER
Staff Writer
The proposed Millican Dam and
Reservoir offers a myriad of possible
benefits and drawbacks to East
Texas residents and Congress is cur
rently hearing both sides of the
story.
The dam represents a work pro
ject and means of flood control to
the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers;
another water supply for sale by the
Brazos River Authority; the flooding
of a valuable lignite field to strip
mining interests; and an ill-
conceived ecological disaster to
local environmentalists.
These entities and others were in
Washington, D.C. Tuesday and
Wednesday to present their argu
ments before .the House appropria
tions subcommittee on Public
Works, the first step in getting an
nual appropriations for the Millican
Dam project.
The Corps of Engineers has asked
Congress for $700,000 this year for
pre-construction plans and design
for the dam. President Gerald Ford
has included $450,000 in his fiscal
1976 budget for Millican, consistent
with his efforts to reduce federal
spending to ease inflation.
Environmentalists, led by the
Environmental Action Council
(EAC) of Brazos County, hope the
project gets no funding this year so
that the plan is eventually scrapped
or modified to meet their demands.
Millican Dam and Reservoir, if
built, will be about 12 miles south
east of College Station on the
Navasota River. This dam and the
Navasota No. 2 dam, to be built
after Millican and further upriver in
Robertson County, were authorized
to be built in the Rivers and Harbor
Act of 1968.
The authorization, however, does
not guarantee that the dams will be
built since annual appropriations for
the projects must be approved.
Over $1.5 million of the $2.5 million
costs estimated by the Corps of En
gineers for the pre-construction
plans and design of Millican Dam
have been appropriated to date.
The Corps is hoping to get approp
riations for actual construction in
1977 or 1978.
The Corps has estimated the en
tire project to cost $149 million.
EAC gripes
Cornelius Van Bavel, immediate
past president of the EAC, told the
House subcommittee this week that
the economic benefits of Millican
have been exaggerated, the current
Millican
AADISOMVILLE.
A series
by Jim Peters
Rod Speer
Greg Moses
plans violate federal law and ignore
the effect of the reservoir on future
energy resources.
The 220-member Environmental
Action Council has been studying
the economic and environmental ef
fects of building Millican for four
years.
Earlier this year, after publishing
two previous reports on the dam,
the council formally voiced its op
position to the Corps of Engineers’
plans.
The EAC contends the water
from the proposed reservoir is not
needed for tbe Bryan-College Sta
tion area, but would be used for in
dustrial and municipal uses on the
Gulf Coast.
The main economic benefit to the
area from the dam, according to Van
Bavel’s statement, would be in in
creased land values around the re
servoir.
“Real estate and construction in
terests, well represented on the
Brazos River Authority Board of Di
rectors, have their own gain in mind
in promotion of this project,” the
EAC statement said.
The EAC has criticized the plans
for the Millican project for not pre
paring for the recreational de
velopment of the reservoir. The
Corps, up until a couple years ago,
had this responsibility but now it
lies with local governments, which
can get federal backing on a match
ing funds basis. The Brazos River
Authority has committed itself to
providing the minimum recrea
tional facilities required by Con
gress when the final plan for con
struction is complete.
Millican Lake, the EAC state
ment says, will permanently flood
more land than it protects. In addi
tion, it contends engineering struc
tures in flood plains generally add to
annual flood damages. No urban
development or areas extensively
used for agriculture would benefit
from the flood control, according to
Van Bavel’s testimony.
Water for Wells
Walter Wells, general manager of
the Brazos River Authority, told the
subcommittee that until the dam is
built the Navasota River will remain
uncontrolled and the lower Brazos
Valley will be subject to costly and
damaging floods.
The Brazos River Authority is a
state agency headed by 21-man
Board of Directors appointed by the
governor for six-year terms. It is re
sponsible for conservation and de
velopment of water resources in the
Brazos River Basin.
The river authority estimates that
if the largest recorded flood to date
(the flood of 1913) were to happen
today, the damage would exceed
$74 million.
Well’s statement to Congress also
cited the growing demands for
water supplies, especially for indus
trial and municipal uses south of
Houston. (Houston, itself, has con
tracted to get water from Lake
Livingston.) Wells said the quality
and quantity of groundwater has de
creased in recent years and the
pumping of groundwater has caused
serious subsidence problems in
several localities.
Millican Lake needs to be in op
eration at the earliest possible date.
Well’s statement contends.
Lignite mining
Coulter Hoppess, a local lawyer
and president of the Navasota River
Improvement Association, also tes
tified at the hearings in Washing
ton. Representing the interest of
Millican landowners for the past 20
years, Hoppess is now concerned
with delaying or preventing con
struction of the dam in order that a
lignite field, which would be
flooded by Millican Lake, could be
strip-mined.
The City of Bryan, jointly with
the Texas Municipal Power Pool, is
purchasing mineral leases in the
area, and plans to eventually
strip-mine and set up a coal-burning
electric steam generating plant.
Bryan Mayor Lloyd Joyce went to
Washington to explain Bryan’s in
terest in the lignite to be flooded.
Monday in Joyce’s first meeting as
mayor, the Bryan City Council re
scinded its support of Congress ap
propriating more funds for Millican
Dam, citing .the lignite question.
(The College Station City Council
decided to neither support nor op
pose this year’s appropriations and
did not send a representative to the
hearings.)
The president of the Friends of
the Navasota River, Richard Bal-
dauf, was also scheduled to testify.
His group is concerned with ecolog
ical damage to the area resulting
from the dam and lake.
A staff spokesman for the public
works subcommittee said it will be
May or June before the subcommit
tee comes up with an appropriations
bill concerning river and harbor
projects.
COL.L1
VTATVIOW
Sites of proposed Millican and
Navasota Reservoirs.
Old-timers recall
history of project
This article is based on a history
compiled by Coulter Hoppess for
the Environmental Action Council.
The history is published in the
EAC’s second report on Millican.
The old-timers around Millican
remember rumors of a nearby prop
osed dam project since the days
they carried books for their best
girls on the way to the whitewashed
schoolhouse.
In 1936, the Brazos River Author
ity (BRA) published an overall prog
ram for the Brazos River Watershed
which proposed one dam on the
Navasota River in northeast Brazos
County.
When a group from Bryan at
tempted to activate construction of
the dam in 1948, it was told by the
BRA Board of Directors that the
dam on the Navasota would have
last priority in development of the
Brazos River Watershed.
One year later, the Corps of En
gineers began studies which even
tually deleted the Navasota dam in
favor of Ferguson Dam which was
proposed three miles south of the
intersection of Highway 30 and the
river.
“They wanted a dam for flood
control, which means they build a
dam and leave it empty,” Rep. Olin
E. Teague, D-Texas, said. A timely
drought in 1950 helped raise public
support for a water conservation
dam.
The Navasota River Authority
was organized in 1952 by Brazos,
Leon, Madison and Robertson
Counties to oppose the Ferguson
Dam in favor of the original
Navasota Dam and Reservoir.
Congress authorized the 13-dam
plan of the BRA, including the Fer
guson Dam in 1954. (An authoriza
tion bill allows Congress to approp
riate money.) In 1958 President
Dwight Eisenhower asked for fund
ing of all authorized public works
projects and the next push for Fer
guson ensued. A new opposition
group, Navasota Landowners As
sociation, joined the battle.
Congress delayed appropriations
for Ferguson Dam because the pro
ject lacked definitive plans.
In 1959 , area industries and gov
ernments met in southern Brazos
county and decided to privately
contract a design for a reservoir
which could control the runoff from
the Navasota River.
According to the Environment
Action Council’s second report on
Millican, firms that were rep
resented included the Texas Board
of Water Engineers, Dow Chemical
Co., Briscoe Irrigation Co.,
Brazoria County Water Co., Ameri
can Canal Co., and the cities of
Bryan, College Station and
Navasota. These groups planned to
build the dam jointly, each paying
on a ratio of anticipated benefits.
Freese, Nichols and Endress, a
Houston engineering consultants
firm, presented the first “Millican
Dam” plan for these groups. On
April 16, 1961 the Texas Board of
Water Engineers, which must ap
prove all reservoirs, passed a resolu
tion saying it would issue only one
permit for a reservoir on the
Navasota.
The one permit, said the resolu
tion, would allow a dam at the Milli
can Dam site for a reservoir of 1.3
million acres. The site and acreage
corresponded with the suggestions
of the Freese, Nichols and Endress
plan.
The permit was later approved by
the Texas Board of Water Engineers
and the plan went to Washington for
authorization.
Prospects looked grim in Con
gress so Dow and the three canal-
irrigation companies withdrew their
support. The BRA has since bought
the American Canal Co. and Briscoe
Irrigation Co.
In 1966 the Corps of Engineers
developed the double dam project
which was authorized in 1968. This
plan, if fully appropriated and con
structed, will build Millican Dam
and Reservoir 15 miles North of
Navasota. About the year 2010, the
Navasota No. 2 Dam and Reservoir
will be built.
Both projects are now getting
money for planning.