SWIMMERS DISAPPOINTED.

Auckland Star, Volume LIX, Issue 223, 20 September 1928, Page 9

SWIMMERS DISAPPOINTED.

"FILTRATION MUST COME." VOTERS TOO CASUAL. I think I express the o;>iuion of every swimmer in Auckland when I say that the rejection of the filtration loan proposal came as a totally unexpected and very disappointing surprise. I am absolutely confident that the result of the poll is not a true expression of public opinion, nor even of the majority of the ratepayers' wishes,'' said Mr. Trevor S. Withers, vice-presi-dent of the Parnell Swimming Club, "Many of those most interested in

swimminpr are non-ratepayers, and were therefore debarred from" voting, while among ratepayers generally the carrying of this loan was regarded as a certainty, and many voters on this account considered it unnecessary to vote, and failed to do so." continued Mr. Withers. "They apparently failed to realise that every such vote uncast was equivalent to a vote acainst the proposal. The poorness of the voting i s "a striking indictment of the apathy all too frequently exhibited by ' Aucklanders in discharging their civic duties. "The result of the poll apparently means that the Parnell Baths at least mnst remain closed this coming season. The extension of the former intake pipe through the railway embankment would not appear, in the light of analytical reports upon the harbour water taken by the Health Department last season, to justify the reopeninsr of these baths. Matter Not Ended.

"The installation of the filtration plants at Parnell and Shelly Beach baths is something which must come, and the swimmers of Auckland will give their whole-hearted support to any move which can now be taken in this direction. We are certainly not going to allow the result of yesterday's poll to put an end to our efforts to improve the swimming facilities of Auckland," Mr. Withers concluded. Mr. J. J. Enwright, president of the Auckland Centre of the New Zealand Swimming Association, also expressed disappointment at the result of the poll. The City Council, he said, had been quite fair in the matter, and had left the decision to the people, and the latter had turned it down flat. He was not surprised that the Point Chevalier scheme had not been supported, but the non-acceptance of the filtration proposal had come as a surprise.