Mr. LONGMIRE. Yes, sir.

Senator ALLOTT. So that the actual work would have to be delegated to someone else and you would have some person other than what you actually purport to have doing the work on this Council. That is No. 1.

No. 2, then if you take a river basin commission and subordinate it to the Council, I am concerned about what happens to the plans and ideas of the local inhabitants, because as a person who has lived with water, with water administration, all of his adult life, I know that the most knowledgeable people about water in any given area are the people who live there. You could in any river basin of your State, I am sure, give me the names off the top of your head of two dozen men who are thoroughly knowledgeable and capable to discuss any aspect of water diversion, water use, or water conservation. Would this not be true?

Mr. LONGMIRE. It certainly would, Senator.

Senator ALLOTT. And the same thing is true in my State. I am sure it is true in the State of the Senator from New Mexico. Therefore, when you take the plans and ideas for development of these people who do know it, they do know it-I have hundreds of them in Colorado who are what I consider experts in their own particular basinsand when you consider their plans and aspirations which are taking place sometimes over a period of 50 years, and then you run into a clash between the advisory council and the commission with respect to a different form of development, what happens? Which one takes precedence? Do you think that the local people then are going to have to give way to the Federal Government's ideas here?

Mr. LONGMIRE. I think that normally they would. That is one of the reasons we are opposed to this Council, as indicated in our statement. We have always asked for sound policy on natural resources for this country. Of course, any bill that is introduced in Congress, any legislation that indicates to us that perhaps we might be a little closer to that goal, we are going to be for it and try to help work out some amendments to it.

As I indicated, we think this is a step in the right direction. We do not think it is a cure-all. We think it is probably something that should come later after other legislation is enacted.

Senator ALLOTT. Particularly do I ask this with relation to section 103, which says:

The Council shall establish, with the approval of the President, principles, standards, and procedures for the preparation of comprehensive regional river basin plans

Then under section 104 it says:

*the Council

(1) determines the efficacy of such plan or revision in achieving optimum use of the water and related land resources in the area involved;

It says "determine." This means fix it in determining. Then going down to (4) it says:

Make such modifications in such plan or revision as are desirable in the national interest.

When I think of some of the process that I have seen advocated, and in fact, I will use the world "promoted," or attempted to be promoted, by some of the departments of Government which everyone in the local

area recognizes as being completely unfeasible, I wonder about putting such power in either the Council or in a commission with respect to these matters.

What I am really trying to get at and out of you is, do you feel that the Federal Government should supersede the plans-they may be very long plans of the State involved and the local people?

Mr. LONGMIRE. Senator, we surely do not want the plans and aspirations of our local people and their wishes overridden by the Federal Government, however, we think that this is a job that the states and the local people are not going to get done by themselves. We are going to have to have assistance from the Federal Government.

Senator ALLOTT. If I understand your statement, which I think is a very fine one, and shows you have given it some thought, what you are trying to say is you think the overall pressure for water development and conservation in the next 25, 30, or whatever it may be, years, and the pressures of the population on it are going to be so intense that some overall planning from the viewpoint of the entire country is necessary.

Mr. LONGMIRE. That is right, sir.

Senator ALLOTT. But you are not convinced of the complete efficacy of either S. 2246 or S. 239?

Mr. LONGMIRE. That is right.

Senator ALLOTT. Thank you very much, sir.

Mr. LONGMIRE. Thank you, sir.

Senator ANDERSON. May I just ask one question?

You say: "We are frankly skeptical about the ability of a Water Resources Council ***" to do certain things. I recognize it is pretty hard for it to do it always, but now I seem to think that you are opposed to the Council. If you are, how do you react to the Council in S. 239? In S. 239, section 4 it says:

There is hereby created an executive Resources and Conservation Council. Do you favor a Resources and Conservation Council and not a Water Council?

Mr. LONGMIRE. We favor that Council under 239 because it reports directly to the President and makes a report once a year. The thing that disturbs me, Senator and members of the committee, is there are too few people in this country that really understand what is going on with our water and soil in the field of agriculture. I will be 50 years old this year. I was born and reared on a farm. Fifty percent or more of the people in this country of my age or older have an agricultural background. In the next generation probably only 8 or 10 or 12 percent of them will have that background. I think we are going to have to set some standards and get some rules together in the next few years or what the Senator was talking about a while ago will happen. Our local people down there that understand a little about water now are getting fewer every year, and water is not the only problem. The soil goes right with it. When you think of water you have to think of the soil and our forests. We are going to have to do a big job of educating the urban people, and if we can dramatize this thing a little bit and get a Council that is directly responsible to the President, get a statement from the President each year as to the state of our natural resources, what is happening to us and where we are going, we think that would be better than this Council of, at the present, four Cabinet members which would report piecemeal.

Senator ANDERSON. You do not think that the Cabinet members are responsible to the President?

Mr. LONGMIRE. Yes, I am sure they are.

Senator ANDERSON. I was going to disabuse your mind if you did not.

Mr. LONGMIRE. Yes. I know they are, but I think this would go around perhaps departmental and bureau rivalries and we would get a little better report perhaps and maybe get it a little faster.

Senator ANDERSON. Thank you very much.

Mr. LONGMIRE. Thank you.

Senator ANDERSON. Mr. Cothren?

Mr. Cothren, you are a forester for the Southern Pine Association?

STATEMENT OF V. W. COTHREN, FORESTER, SOUTHERN PINE ASSOCIATION, ON BEHALF OF THE NATIONAL LUMBER MANUFACTURERS ASSOCIATION

Mr. COTHREN. Yes, I am.

Senator ANDERSON. What is your background in forestry?

Mr. COTHREN. I was raised in a small lumber town and worked in the mills prior to World War II.

Senator KERR. Where?

Mr. COTHREN. Dierk, Ark.

Senator KERR. I just wondered if you do not have some kinfolks over in Oklahoma.

Mr. COTHREN. Yes, sir; I think I do.

Senator KERR. That is the reason I was asking whereabouts. It is a very familiar name in the timber area in southern Oklahoma. Mr. COTHREN. Yes, sir; my family has been dependent on timber for many years.

Senator ANDERSON. Now that you have established your connection with Oklahoma, you are in good hands.

Mr. COTHREN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I am Virgil W. Cothren, forester for the Southern Pine Association and member of the Forestry Advisory Committee for the National Lumber Manufacturers Association, on whose behalf I appear today.

The National Lumber Manufacturers Association is a federation of 16 regional, species, and products associations, including the Southern Pine Association, representing the lumber manufacturing industry in all parts of the United States.

The lumber industry believes that the wise use of our forest resources is vital in maintaining this basic industry and the communities dependent upon it. Consequently, we are deeply concerned with any legislation which may affect forest management on the one-fourth of our Nation which is forest land.

I want to affirm at the outset that the lumber industry realizes the tremendous importance of water to our individual and national strength and development. In some areas watershed management is synonymous with forest management.

The lumber industry is seriously concerned with the intent expressed in the words "water and related land resources" and the implication that water is intended to be paramount to all other natural resources and activities. Although we agree water is highly important, it cannot be justified as having such overriding dominance as to make all other resources and activities subservient to it.

President Kennedy recognized the interrelationship of natural resources during his campaign when he stated:

As our needs mount and as population grows, it will become increasingly essential that we consider all our resources in the light of their relationship to each other * *

The dangers of considering water first, and all other resources later, is evident to us concerned with forestry. The agencies most intimately concerned with water resource administration and development would be supreme in the commissions; other agencies would be reduced in importance and effectiveness.

Senator ANDERSON. Are you laboring under the feeling that this bill places water above all other land resources?

Mr. COTHREN. Yes, sir.

Senator ANDERSON. If there were a bill before the Public Works Committee that says, "A bill for the planning of highways and other resources of the Nation," do you feel that would place roads above everything else?

Mr. COTHREN. No, Mr. Chairman, I do not, but this says "related land resources."

Senator ANDERSON. Then why are you worried about it here? Mr. COTHREN. Well, forestry is related resource to water. Senator KERR. I believe what he has said to you is that although it might be the implication over there, it would not concern him because he is concerned with forests which he regards as a related industry to water and not the highways.

Senator ANDERSON. I understand what you are talking about, but I just do not see where he gets the inference that because the bill deals with water, he therefore regards water as more prominent than everything else.

Mr. COTHREN. Well, if forestry is included as a related resource, from our impression water is considered paramount, if we are lumped in as a related resource.

Senator ANDERSON. All right.

Mr. COTHREN. The lack of guidelines for the consideration of "related resources" gives further reason for our fears that forestry will be treated in a secondary manner by this bill. We in the lumber industry have long maintained that in computing the cost-benefit ratio of proposed water projects, full consideration should be given to the adverse effects on productive timberlands, access roads, and other natural resource related developments.

The approach in S. 2246 conflicts with the President's declaration that

our entire society rests upon-and is dependent upon-our water, our land, our forests, and our minerals. How we use these resources influences our health, security, economy, and well-being.

We are in agreement with the President and the sponsors and supporters of the various bills on this subject that Federal natural resource programs are in need of coordination. The President, in his natural resource message of last February 23, which was designedto bring together in one message the widely scattered policies of the Federal Government

summarized the problem very well, saying:

In the past, these policies have overlapped and often conflicted. Funds were wasted on competing efforts. Widely differing standards were applied to

measure the Federal contribution to similar projects. Funds and attention devoted to annual appropriations or immediate pressures diverted energies away from long-range planning for national economic growth. Fees and user charges wholly inconsistent with each other, with value received, and with public policy have been imposed at some Federal developments.

The President then stated his intention to establish a Presidential Advisory Committee on Natural Resources within the Council of Economic Advisers.

Senator ANDERSON. If you are worrying as to why he did not do that, it might be pointed out that this committee and other committees tried to point out that the proper home for an advisory committee on natural resources was not within the Council of Economic Advisers. I think he had bad advice when he proposed to put it within the Council of Economic Advisers, and so did the Council of Economic Advisers.

Mr. COTHREN. In testimony before the Interior and Insular Affairs Committee on S. 239, Mr. Bernard L. Orell, chairman of NLMA's Forest Management Committee, stated:

We sincerely believe that it is desirable and of increasing necessity to have good coordination of Government conservation programs in order to eliminate conflicts and duplication and make them more efficient.

Accordingly, the National Lumber Manufacturers Association recommends that a Presidential Commission on Natural Resources be established either by legislative or by executive action.

The situation at the present time requires all the agencies in each department to be coordinated by its Secretary and requires the President to coordinate the programs between different departments. A conservation commission would serve to analyze these programs for the President and recommend how they might be coordinated and administered to best serve our Nation.

We have recommended the establishment of a Presidential Commission on Natural Resources almost identical with the council proposed in section 101 of this bill, S. 2246. However, we recommended the Commission have the function of coordinating natural resource activities, eliminating duplication and correcting the problems set forth in the President's natural resource message.

Such a Commission as we recommended, unlike the Council in S. 2246, would possess the authority and responsibility to be an effective force in coordinating national resource programs. All conservation policies, those affecting our soils, water, timber, minerals, wildlife, fisheries, and so forth, would be related to one another by coordinated action. The proper balance between Federal budgets for natural resource conservation, development and use would be maintained by combining in one body the knowledge, responsibility and the authority of each member of the Commission.

At the hearing on S. 239 several Senators referred to serious differences of opinion with the Bureau of the Budget on natural resource matters. This difficulty might be overcome if the Director of the Bureau of the Budget was made a member of the Commission.

Senator KERR. Just a minute. Do you think the difficulty would be overcome insofar as the differences of opinion were concerned, if the Director of the Bureau of the Budget became the dominant. influence or controlling one in the Council?

Mr. COTHREN. No, sir, Senator Kerr. We were thinking of a coordinated effort among the members to work it out before it comes out of the Commission.