CHEERFUL SERVICE

Evening Post, Volume CXV, Issue 34, 10 February 1933, Page 8

CHEERFUL SERVICE

CITY RATE COLLECTOR

MR. GODBER RETIRING

FOETY YEAES' WOEK

Mr. H. L. Godber, who vacates the chair of City Bate Collector on Monday, after 40 years of service with the City Council, 25 of them as rate collector, should surely be Wellington's most patient citizen, for the very position which he has held for so'many years has given him lots of practice. Some one has to stand up to the complaining of ratepayers, more bitter when times are hard, and, though no mention is made of it on the schedule of duties, it seems to be the rate collector's job; anyhow, he has to do it. Tv spite of it all, Mr. Godber—Harry Godber to almost everyone out of office hours—is still completely cheerful in his work, though he will admit that; the last two or threo years have been, rather wearing. Mr. Godber joined the council's service in 1893 as junior office boy to the other eleven who built up tho council's staff, including overseers. Presumably his duties were as mixed and various as those of other office boys and were well carried out, for in 1908 he was appointed rate collector, upon, whose head complaints and revilings at once began to rain, and some of the old letters he has kept sltow that convincingly. The ratepayers could reach him more easily than they could the 15 Mayors and 110 councillors under which he has served during his forty years. CHANGES IN SYSTEM. Bating systems have been changed several times since 1893. In that year the city was administered under the ward system, the four divisions being1 Thorndon, Lambton, Te Aro, and Cook. The city was then bounded: by the Thorndon quay-Tinakori road line on the north and by the Town Belt and the sea in other directions. The area was small, 3620 acres; to-day it is roughly 16,000 acres, due, of course, to the amalgamation of the old Melrose, Onslow, Karori, and Miramar boroughs. The first batch of rate demands sent out by Mr. Godber totalled £.45,871; the demand for the current year is £508,000. The area has been multiplied by about four and a half and the rate demand by roughly eleyen, but all values have, of course, risen greatly in 25 years. In the old ward days, said Mr. Godber to-day, the rating was upon annual value, but in the year following the abolition of the ward system, a composite system was adopted, the general rates being struck on tie unimproved value, and hospital, water, and street lighting rates being levied on the annual value. This held until Ist April, 1928, when the present system of unimproved value Tating for all purposes was adopted. APPRECIATIONS TKOM KAXTEPAYERS. And that was about as far as the talk went this morning, for ;the 10 per cent, on late payment will be enforced from next Tuesday anfl the telephone became too insistent for consecutive thinking. Mr. Godber handed "The Post" reporter a file of old letters and turned to the telephone, knowing precisely what was coming to him as rate collector, the- man appointed to take the knocks. Some of the letters were strong. They can be passed; others were fine examples of clever excusing. Here are some of them:— "H. L. Godber, Esq.—l am writing with both' hands, as I have been very ill since the last voting dayl Tell your 'flad myself and wifie and my friends voted for Mm. Yours. . . ." A clear case of mistaken identity, for the writer confused Mr. Godber's uncle with his father. Still, it softened the blow. . Inability to sign a cheque was also pleaded in this note: "Be the rates: I am laid up in the Sands of Dr. —— for six weeks, and the moment I can sign a cheque you will have the account, as the money is laying rotting itf the bank. I say, I heard yon had gone., to the front to shoot the Germans. '' And a really wratby note, scrawled over the back of the demand: "I have just received this swindling, thievish, blackmailing demand from your cursed council. I swear I -mil not pay. May the contemptible, thievish council be cursed for all time." (Office note attached: "Paid, 8/8/ H.") There are many complaints of faulty addresses, but this one stands out: "Kindly address'to ~ . My dear and Christian wife (in whose name the property stood) left for a new and much better address seven years ago." A very well-known citizen wrote thus, quite recently: "Herewith, enclose you a cheque on my ... street property. Taking the council as a whole they are a parcel of messers and wasters." In the year following his appointment as collector Mr. Godber was properly chastised by a "Wellington doctor: "I want to say that your action in letting judgment by default go against me yesterday was one none of your predecessors wouia have dreamt "of "taking. I am willing, "however, to believe that you acted in what you thought to be the proper official manner. Young men, new to office*, and who perhaps ' lack both tact and imagination of any kind often do this sort of thing. That any of your seniors would endorse- your action I do not for one moment believe." (Office note: "3?our notices and two telephone messages were sent.") Another rather nasty one: "Knowing as I do how much the money must be needed to make up for some of the waste and extravagance in connection with the ... muddle I am herewith paying my rates and hope that they will be put to a better use than was the case with last year's rates." A Happy Valley ratepayer mislaid his demand, but that did not matter: "Sorry I can't find the original rate demand; anyhow, you are darned lucky to get it at all." - A Brooklyn ratepayer offered a constructive, if ungrammatical, suggestion: "Hope the Wellington City Council or ratepayers would form, fishing permits for the holiday fishing parties at Island Bay ana Happy Valley without outraging the women and children to bring in the tax money." A seafaring man's excuse has been kept to the (last; it would be a shame to alter his spelling: "Werry sory to kip yqu whiting, but I have been vind bound for 14 days on the kost. Eespeckful " The members of the "Wellington City Council Social Club have asked Mr. Godber and Mr. B. Tait, who is also retiring from the council service after forty years' work, next week, to meet them on the evening of 21st February at a farewell gathering.