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Hokitika Guardian, 28 July 1919, Page 2

At the last meeting of the Borough Council, the town was given the advantage of an expert's opinion on the ornamentation of Cass square and the cemetery. With regard to the opinions expressed the layman can have little to offer in criticism, but it does appear that the expert takes contradictory views of the trees in the two places. While th e trees on the Square are roundly condemned, those at the cemetery are held in more affectionate tegard, and we must confess that we cannot follow the expert in his reasoning on these lines. What is proposed in regard to the Square is a new ornamentation scheme, which put into effect will cost a very considerable sum, and it will not be wise to expend the large amount involved unless the Council is prepared to carry on, and maintain the plantation as it should be. The Council lias not shown any taste or inclination for this work in the past, and our last state might be worse than the first if we lose the trees, and have an ill-assorted or neglected plantation in their place. We must confess to a love for trees and particularly to those on .the Square, which to Mr Buchanan’s are “unsightly”, yet at the cemetery they arc “effective” and “should not be interfered with at present.” Townfolk are more familiar with the Square plantation. Those trees have been the friends of our youth, and arc now the companions of our maturer years. Their destruction would make an ugly gap in the centre of the town, the measure of which can he gauged somewhat if we imagine Cass Square without its belt of surrounding trees.

I'TtOM what we have just written We would plead with the Borough authorities to spare the trees. They arc associate with the history of the town, and in summer time form an acceptable shade which has made the Square on attractive picnic ground for thousands of visitors in the past. If the trees are removed there will be an ugly gaping Square, shelterless, and uninviting for many years, for the plantation to replace them, even if the Council is prepared to spend the hundreds of pounds necessary, will take years to mature to an effective height. In the past the local body has not taken that interest in th e maintenance of the appearance of the Square it should have done, and thore is not any guarantee it will do so in the future. We fear the town will lose the substance of what it has for the shadow of a- scheme which the authorities will not he disposed to realise. This to our mind is a veiy present danger. The alleged harm to the grass sward is a fallacy. For years the ground has lain iallow and there has been no real attempt to grow a grass sward. The trees do not rob the centre grounds of any real moiety of the sun, and if the Square were ploughed and drainage attended to the soil would quickly respond with a good sole of grass, if the seed were put in first No real scheme of improvements to the gqunre can be carried out without a considerable expenditure of money, and the Council must needs decide on this point before they attempt a piece-meal system of mutilation which will he a reproach to the Council, and an eyesore to the people.