Wednesday, February 5, 2014

PL93-620 U2a. May 1974: On to the Interior Committee; The Havasupai Lock it Down


Udall's story, and ours will now get recombined, preparing for the Committee mark-up in July 1974. There will be some repetition of items mentioned  in my post "T3…Championing the Havasupai". My journal furnishes the main time line in this entry.

Udall and staff were receiving mail and petitioners. We were circulating among the congressional offices, talking up our viewpoint, and trying to stoke letters, while other lobbyists were certainly doing the same. The Hualapai were not only lobbying for their dam, but in April their governing body had passed a resolution to join with the Havasupai to request Congress to return to the latter in trust the 215 kac they had been using under their free permit (Res. 16-74, 4/24/74). Whatever the circumstances that had led to that action, it would have been over-shadowed several days later by Sparks' success working with presidential staff, when President Nixon landed at Phoenix' Sky Harbor and announced his support for the Havasupai reservation enlargement on 3 May.