The Dominion. THURSDAY, DECEMBER 29, 1910. CIVIC EDUCATION.

Dominion, Volume 4, Issue 1011, 29 December 1910, Page 4

The Dominion. THURSDAY, DECEMBER 29, 1910. CIVIC EDUCATION.

The New York November 17 contains a long and very interesting account ot. an Exhibition which is worth some notice here, not only bccausc it was a novel and useful undertaking, but because the idea of it strikes us as one that might in some way bo appropriated by Now Zealand. This was the "City Budget Exhibition," lasting for a month, and arranged by the authorities with the object of making the public acquainted with the facts and figures of tho city's government. The Budget Exhibit Committee began by requesting tho heads of tho various city departments to proparo exhibits of all kinds—models, pictures, charts, moving pictures—relating to the finances pf the city. A large building was rented in Broadway. The show was very much more than a temporary Municipal MuEeum, for, in addition to tllo voluminous chart-analyses of every section of tho city's revenue and expenditure, there were moving pictures and i addresses. The kinematograph explained how tho Police and I'irc De-partments-did their work; an "Electric Press Bulletin" flashed at every citizen that hurried by 'the list of his municipal prerogatives. The citizen was told, for 1 instance, "that tho-Public Service Commission was ready with a man to take his name and address and investigate, for him, without charge, whether his gas meter worked correctly. He was made acquainted with the-fact that the Department oi Water Supply, Gas, and Electricity had attendants, in the exhibit, who would demonstrate how two-thirds more -illumination could be 'secured in his own homo and at one-half the present cost. Ho was informed that ho would bo' taught how to read his own gas meter. AlsoJ that fire heroes and modal winners' of the Fire Department were, waiting inside to instruct him in how properly to send in a fire alarm," and so on. Every noon some commissioner delivered an acl- - dress in the. Assembly. Hall on the work of his department, and invited the audience to make any. complaints or supply any.information -as.'to waste and extravagance. In the afternoon "bureau chicfs" gave addresses :\there was 1 a'Health Day, a Finance Day, an' Education Day, a Police Day, a Fire Department Day; a ..Tax Day, a Street Cleaning Day, a Charities Day, a Park Day,, and a Corrections Day.' The purpose of tho exhibition was, not morePy to give the public a general idea of-the business of city management, but to supply every posr sible kind of detailed information, in order that the public might be led to understand the financial side o'f municipal government, and, understanding'it, to acquire a real in-' tercst in it. Since New York is an enormous city, and its administration requires annually about 170,000,000 dollars, or not much les6 than threo times the sum used un bv the Government of Now Zealand in. a year, there was obviously ample scope for the display of interesting and educative facts. . It cost 77,47.3,084 dollars to administer the.affairs of-the city in 1898, and 163,128,270 dollars in .1910, an increase from 23| to 33 dollars a head. Tho details of the expenditures, and the increases in them, were all. clearly set forth in charts- The various departments .explained why their expenditures increased, and how they hach effected economies as they went along. The exhibition lasted for a month, and •was visited by 800,000 persons altogether.. Its succcss has already inspired all tho other leading cities in tho United States with the idea of holding "Budget Shows" of their own. We do not know whether it would be a very -largo or very impressive exhibition that Wellington would bo able to furnish as a "Budget Show," but it can hardly bp questioned that such an exhibition would make for a quickening of the public's interest in municipal affairs. Our city's Budget is growing into a big thing, ancl it will continue to grow; yet they arc few who tako any real interest in the way in which the' Corporation raises ancl spends its revenue. One.cannot help thinking how much more useful and instructive the Christchurch Exhibition of 1906-7 would have been had there been a Budget section in it, conducted on the lines of tho New York Budget Show. The visitor to that exhibition was able to learn nearly everything about the country oxcepting particulars of the way in which it is financed. In the meantime there is a fine mass of apathy, waiting to be removed by some method of showing tho citizen that municipal government is interesting and important enough to deserve his -study.