CITY WORKS

Dominion, Volume 14, Issue 29, 29 October 1920, Page 7

CITY WORKS

CHANGE OI\METHOD URGED.

Councillor T. Forsyth made the euffgestion at last evening's meeting of tho City Council that a works Committee should be set up to keep an eye on tho various works which concerned the citv. At present there were little bits of wor* going on here and there, and they had no direct control. He was also ot opinion that the Finance Committer should be the council as ft whole. Councillor B. A. Wright thought that the proposal was a most important one, The time was coming when the city "wpuld have to appoint a general manager. who would nave a certain control over all works that were in progress. How was it possible to expect business men to spend all the time necessary in supervising the .various "works-, that were being carried out? A man petting .£IOOO a year would have to sacrifice half his salary if ho were going to ask them to do Buch work as was done by Councillors Norwood and Dennett (in connection with the Milk Department). How the city expected men to undertake such work was amazing.. Councillor P. Fraser $ud they should rule .that no member of Parliament should be-a member of the council. (Laughter.) Councillor Bennett said he had 4 long been of the opinion that there should ho a Works Department. At present tlia work was done hero and there'and nothing was gone through and oompleted. The way the work'was done was a dis--grace to the City Council and to tho city. The Mayor said that there was super--ision. The city was divided up into blocks, and tlwro was a works supervisor 'for each one. He reminded tho council that.years ago when lie was a councillor there was a Works Committee, and they used to meet on a separate night, with the result that when the committee brought down it£ rejsort half of it was upset by ths council as a whole. What work was to be done was set forth iii the ostimates, and the City Engineer was the responsible officer to see that the works provided for wore carried out according to the money available. As to ihe suggestion-of n'general manager he was against it. entirely. It was beTngr tried in America, but there, Tie believed, the leading men were so busy making money that they had been forced to adopt some other method. Even in America the idea was ouly an experiment.

Several councillors ventured Hie opinion that the City Engineer (Mr. W. IT. Morton) was being overloaded with work, mid that lie should be relieved in certain directions.

The Mayor also reminded • the council that councillors were kept advised of what work was jjoing on by means of the fortnightly list of works. Councillor C" IT. Chapman pointed out that the report was a stereotyped one, and that, some of tlio works mentioned were not carried out at all. It should be a report of work actually accomplished in the preceding fortnight.