The Feilding Star. THURSDAY, APRIL 16, 1885. The Borough Council

Feilding Star, Volume VI, Issue 129, 16 April 1885, Page 2

The Feilding Star. THURSDAY, APRIL 16, 1885. The Borough Council

.*. The condition of the affairs of the Borough Council and the management of the financial business of the Borough, demands that the burgesses should at once take steps to have themselves informed as to their actual position. There is only one reasonable means to be adopted to this end, and that is to invite the Mayor, who is now retiring from office, to give an account of his stewardship since he occupied the Mayoral chair. As he has filled that office for two years in succession, he will be well able to enlighten his fellow ratepayers on the history of municipal events during that time. The ratepayers have a right to know how the responsible duties which have been placed in the hands of the Mayor and Councillors have been executed. On this point they are at present lamentably in the dark, for neither a candidate for municipal honors, nor a Councillor who has retired from the onerous obligations he had accepted, has ever enlightened them with his views when about to enter the Council, or when from public or private reasons he throws them up and retires from public life. The honor of serving as a Borough Councilor does not appear to be held in high estimation, and the position has been in too many cases lightly accepted, and as lightly thrown up when pique or prejudice was in any way excited either from causes at the Council table, or mild pressure from without, or probably when an edge had been put on the axe that wanted grinding when the party took office. What we want to know is, tow the money is spent ? How much in salaries and commission? How much in working expenses ? How much in works of construction and maintenance, and last, but not least, how much in law? When these questions are answered, then the ratepayers may be satisfied, but not till then. We have cried, " Peace ! Peace ! when there seems to have been no peace," long enough, and think the time has now arrived for the burgesses to demand from each and every member of the Council a public statement of his views on the present condition of the Borough, and the remedies he has to suggest, if any.