48 Second Annual Report of the 



authorities of an existing water supply system to abandon a con- 

 taminated source of supply, to eliminate sources of pollution, or 

 to install and maintain proper nitration or other purification 

 works, has been granted to certain departments and commissions 

 in other States. 



All sewerage and drainage projects, which are required to be 

 approved by any State commission or department, must also be 

 approved by this Commission. One hundred and fourteen pro- 

 jects have been passed upon during the past year. The law should 

 be amended so as to define with more exactitude the duties of the 

 Commission in this regard. 



Inspection of Docks and Dams. 



Supervision and inspection of all dams (excepting those form- 

 ing a part of the State canal system) and all such docks as are by 

 law placed under the supervision of the Conservation Commis- 

 sion, have been continued during the fiscal year. 



A system of records has been devised by means of which ready 

 reference can be made to the maps, plans and papers pertaining to 

 each dam so far inspected. 



In the course of the next two years, it is expected that the 

 inspection records will include every dam of sufficient importance 

 to make its possible failure a menace to life and property. 



In the case of all new dams or reconstructed dams, the plans 

 have been examined and approved, amended or rejected, as the 

 merits of each case required. 



Plans for sixty-four dams have been approved during the fiscal 

 year. Forty-six other dams have been inspected and strengthening 

 or improvements ordered or recommended. 



Twenty- two dams have failed or gone out during the fiscal year. 

 A few of these were large and important structures. Each of 

 these dams, immediately following its failure, has been inspected, 

 and the causes of failure, so far as possible, ascertained. 



All of the dams which failed were constructed before the exist- 

 ence of the Commission and many of them were old, while a few 

 were intended to be of modern and good design, in the construc- 

 tion of which the owners did not try to keep down cost, at the risk 

 of disaster. 



