WASHINGTON — Bills to help protect Utahns from dangerous canals and to protect and research dinosaur bones advanced in the Senate Wednesday.

The Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee passed by voice vote the two bills by Sen. Bob Bennett, R-Utah, and sent them to the full Senate, which is speeding toward a targeted adjournment for the year on Oct. 8.

One bill would transfer the title of the 42-mile-long Salt Lake Aqueduct (running from Deer Creek Reservoir to Salt Lake County), the 22-mile Provo Reservoir Canal (also known as the Murdock Canal) and a 4-acre maintenance shop site from the federal government to the Metropolitan Water District of Salt Lake and Sandy.

The district has said it needs clear title to the facilities to obtain low-interest, tax-advantaged financing to upgrade them — including plans to completely bury the Murdock Canal.

Interest in that legislation peaked last year when two brothers drowned attempting to scuba dive in a portion of that canal that is underground now.

John R. Carman, general manager of the metropolitan water district, told the committee during a hearing in May, "Fourteen people have drowned in the Provo Reservoir Canal in the last 20 years. Enclosure would virtually eliminate this risk."

He noted that local water users have paid the cost of the facilities over the years, but the federal government still holds the title. The Bush administration supports the bill, and has said planned improvements would increase safety and loss of water from evaporation and seepage.

The other bill would authorize creating a new federal center to store and study Jurassic-era bones. It would be built adjoining the recently completed Utah Field House of Natural History Museum in Vernal.

Associate National Park Service Director Janet Snyder Matthews told the committee in a hearing in June, "The (new state) Field House will provide visitors and residents access to the museum and programs on the natural history of the area, while the (federal) Uinta (Research and Curatorial) Center will provide the storage and research function of a world-class museum."

She noted that 609,000 bones from Dinosaur National Monument are currently stored at 11 facilities at that park, including some garages. Also, its curatorial staff now works in crowded aisles of the old paleo lab at the Quarry Visitor Center.

"Of the 957 museum standards currently applicable to the park, the park barely meets 50 percent of them. This new facility would allow the park to meet nearly 98 percent of those standards," she said.

Bennett earlier told the committee, "Because of the co-location, National Park Service staff, visiting scholars, interns and volunteers would have access to the state museum's space for exhibit, classroom, conferencing, education, rest room, public access, parking and other needs not included in the curatorial facility."

Matthews said the Interior Department is planning funding for the new $8.8 million facility into budgets for fiscal 2007. She said it is also planning to rehabilitate the historic Quarry Visitor Center in the national monument at the same time.

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