ROAD BOARD MATTERS, OKAIN'S DISTRICT.

Akaroa Mail and Banks Peninsula Advertiser, Volume 3, Issue 281, 28 March 1879, Page 2

ROAD BOARD MATTERS, OKAIN'S DISTRICT.

To the Editor of the AJcaroa Mail.

Sir, —I am very much pleased to note your presence at the Okain's Road Board meetings, as the publicity which will be given to our actions ought to cause us to be more guarded in our assertions for fear of the wholesome ridicule which invariably condemns those who speak at random and without due regard for integrity and truth. Your report of the doings at Okain's on Saturday last gives me the opportunity of being able to contradict an assertion of the Chairman, J. B. Barker, to the effect that I had offered to give a small piece of land required for road purposes and afterwards claimed £25 for the same. Both statements undoubtedly owe their origin to Mr Barker's wonderfully prolific imaginative powers. I certainly told Mr Fenton that I had no objection to his taking the road through my land, jmd I am also equally certain that I never lold any person whatever that I required £25 for the same. In quantity there-is nearly half an acre, and the value I put-upon it, including fencing, was from £15 to £20. I shall be quite willing to take the published offer of the Board for the land only, and shall require the fencing about five chains, substantial and sheep proof, to be erected before the land is thrown open.

The public will now see and judge for themselves whether my claim is just and reasonable or not. Had Mr Barker been inclined the matter would have been settled at a former meeting, when he preferred instead to treat my offer with cpntempt by putting on his hat and leaving the room as soon as I mentioned the subject. There is one other matter on which, with your kind permission, I have a word to say, that is, the irregularity of our ordinary meetings. This, in my humble opinion, is not only unlawful (see clauses 114 and 119 Canterbury Koad Ordinance, 72), but it seems such a farce that an honorary body such as a Eoad Board is supposed to be (payment for services not allowed), should alter its ordinary meeting day a week earlier at the bidding of one of its members, and for the only reason that he belongs to another branch of the local rulers, and cannot be ruling both bodies on the one day. I often feel a pang of sorrow when contemplating what might be the fate of us if our poor district should lose its chief.—Yours, &c, P. CALLAGE AN.