WAKANUI RIVER BOARD.

Ashburton Guardian, Volume VII, Issue 1920, 16 August 1888, Page 3

WAKANUI RIVER BOARD.

TO THE EDITOR. Bet, — I |have seen ;ln your Issue of Tuesday a report of the meeting of the Wakanul River Board on Saturday last. The report states that a deputation of ratepayers waited on the Board and prevented a petition that it |was intended to '■end to flis Eioellency the Governor taking him to have the River Board •bottahed^ Now sir, as one o! the deputation referred to, I must say that thla paragraph of the report is most lnoorreot and misleading as it means to imply that the objeot the deputation had In view m coming before the board wai to pre■ent this petition. The fact Is the prio* olpal part of the deputation referred to, myself amongst the rest, neither signed the petition nor knew anything whatever about It being got np. nor were we m favor of the district beiag abolished. Oar object wai to try to get the petition § quashed or withdrawn by laying the views and opinion! of the ratepayers before the Board, hoping that the Board would oon■ent to aot m accordance with {the wishes of the ratepayers. I may here aay that the ratepayers unanimously deolare that the sate proposed to be levied Is oppres* •tve. I personally dont objeot to the rate myself. Although heavy it may be all required, bat I think It Is of the utmost Importance that the Board and ratepayers should be In harmony and sympathy with aaoh other, and I feel sure that the Board baa made a great mistake m acting m ■uch a high handed way at the very start, fin* with tegard to the classification of the Una and now with tegatd to the proposed tate. Sir, as I have said, the object of the deputation m coming before the Board was not to present a petition, but the Board having met that day according to advertisement to strike the river rate, we Appeared to lay before the Board the well known views of the ratepayer!, with certain proposals that (f agreed to by the Board a promise had been given that the petition would be withdrawn. When the deputation came before the Board and before they got speaking or telling their business, the Chairman got np and made a statement somewhat to the effect that they did not Intend to strike the rate that day, but would wait for tome time till they would find out the views of the ratepayers, and that we might withdraw as they did not wish to discuss the matter with us. After several attempts tv speak, to let our real business be known, and every time being rudely Interrupted by the Chairman, he ordered Mr Fooks to go for the police if we did net withdraw at once, and said that the Board wai not to be dictated tol I think those present must admit that there was nothing said or done to warrant sending for the police. Besides If the Board wished to have the views of the ratepayers expressed before striking the rate they sever could have got * better opportunity than that day, as all the district wag then ; the promoters of the petition with the names of the subscribers, and the non-subscribers were nearly about all present, and the Iwo together comprised the whole district. We have heard much of late of the Importance it is to the ratepayers of having control over the luoal bodies, but any of the Wakannl ratepayers I think cannot boast much of the control they have over their loosl bodies ; but, of course, they deserve this when they allow men to step In and have power who have no respect for their wishes or opinions, and instead of representing them are oontlnnally misrepresenting them, I may say m closing that it Is not so much the River District as the persond or construction of the Board, and as the people have no confidence m the Board as at present constituted, the best thing they can do is to get op a petition calling on the Board to resign; If this were signed by a major Ity of the ratepayers I think they would not be so mean and unprincipled as to refuse to do so. I am, etc, Ratepaybb.