The Guardian And Evening Star, with which is incorporated the West Coast Times. WEDNESDAY, SEPT. 20, 1933. THE BOROUGH POLICY.

Hokitika Guardian, 20 September 1933, Page 4

The Guardian And Evening Star, with which is incorporated the West Coast Times. WEDNESDAY, SEPT. 20, 1933. THE BOROUGH POLICY.

Thehe is a good deal 0 f critical comment on a proposal lately brought forward at the Borough Council* to make an extraordinary charge oil hotels for water used i n baths and in urin'als. Seeing that the Council again kept up the rating levy, it might be thought there was ample revenue, particularly as street and general expenditure is now relieved so substantially by utilising unemployed labour. Th© hotels supply a main source of revenue to the local body, the bulk of which is collected promptly puce a year through licensing fees. Likewise, the hotel proprietors arc substantial ratepayers. They also cater liberally for tourist traffic. In times past there was the complaint that hotel accommodation required improving to meet the wishes of tourist traffic. The principal hotels responded very adequately and incurred a large expenditure, and travellers are catered for excellently. Unfortunately tile depression came along, affecting tourist traffic both internal and overseas, and there has not up to the present, been an adequate response for the expense incurred. These facts should be known to the councillors as ordinary business men, and they must re’alis© that in these quiet times the hotel-keepers are as badly struck as any other section of the community. They are dominated also by rigorously enforced laws under both the licensing not and labour employment. These bear heavily find check trade, while a staff has to be maintained and regular wages paid whatever the state of trade. The hotelkeeper is deserving of both sympathy and consideration on the part of the Council, the revenues of which have been con* tributed to so largely over the years, anti to which the revenue ha? to be maintained without any claim for deferment. Before the Council takes the step which has been suggested, it would be well for members to turn the facts over in their minds. The Council should recognise also its own remissness in the matter of public urinals, which is something of a blot on the civic management. The hotel conveniences do much to meet what the Council has failed to supply, and in that way meet a public requirement without cost to the Borough. As to the baths, many families are larger in number unfortunately than the hotel patrons at most times of the year, 'and it would be very unfair to saddle a special cost on the hotelkeeper in providing the convenience of a bath which is a necessity, under the law and a natural requirement for patrons. The Council cannot be so hard up that it must needs look for revenue from such a source. Besides, there is ample water, the average at last report being eight feet in the reservoir. The hotels pay a large share of the special rate covering the water works loan, and they assisted in that direction because there was the promise that when the water was brought in there would be ample for all household requirements, which of course included the needs of hotels. To put on -a special tax now is both unfair and quite unjust, and the matter should ho carefully considered before such a step is taken .