The President's News Conference

APPOINTMENTS

THE PRESIDENT. Someone wants to know about a report that the President is contemplating appointing a city manager for the District of Columbia. I had not heard of the subject.

Someone else wants to know if we are going to appoint the Chief of Engineers in the next few days. I am not going to appoint him in the next few days. He must be appointed sometime.

I have one other matter of some general interest in that I have reappointed Mr. Albert C. Williams as a member of the Federal Farm Loan Bureau. I expect we are going to have difficulty in keeping these two boards apart, but this is the Loan Board. Mr. Williams, as you know, has been on the Board for some years, and is from Texas.

DEVELOPMENT OF CALIFORNIA WATER RESOURCES

I have some matters of interest to the State of California--perhaps not so much of general interest. I have been engaged for some time, in [p.251] collaboration with the Governor [Clement C. Young] of California in the development of two problems in that State. One is the coordination of their State and Federal water development in that State. The other is over the San Francisco-Oakland or Alameda Bridge.

Some years ago I advocated the coordination of the Federal and different State agencies in the determination of the fact and the development of water supply in the State of California. There are some nine different independent agencies that have a relationship to that problem.

The Governor of California in the last session of the legislature arranged for an appropriation from the State government to carry out an investigation of water supply problems. And we have agreed to the appointment of a commission, upon which the Federal Government will be represented by a delegate from the War Department, one from the Power Commission and one from the Department of the Interior. The Governor will appoint representatives of the different departments in the State government and some leading citizens. The purpose of that commission is to determine the fact and to develop some coordinated policies with regard to the development of the water resources of California in connection with irrigation, navigation, flood control, and power.

SAN FRANCISCO BAY BRIDGE COMMISSION

The other question is the San Francisco bridge, a matter that has agitated that community for some years. Recently the State Legislature of California, at the request of the Governor, made certain authorities in that matter, and we have agreed upon the appointment of that commission to comprise two representatives of the Navy Department, two of the War Department, one from each of the communities on the two opposite sides of the bay, two from the State of California, and one further citizen of the West whom I shall appoint and who will probably be Mr. Mark Requa.

The purpose of that commission is to see if they can determine the proper location and to secure the assent of the different Federal and State agencies and the local community to the proper location of the [p.252] bridge, which has been subject to contention now for as far back as I can recollect.