MUNICIPAL ENTERPRISE.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XXXIII, Issue 966, 14 March 1911, Page 3

MUNICIPAL ENTERPRISE.

(To the Editor). Sir.—The logical and businesslike address by his Worship the Mayor on the necessity for the borough to erect a hall for the use of the people of the district, and your caustic comments thereon should supply food for thought for ratepayers and the general public who have the interests of the town and district at heart. The trend of municipal progress all over the world is in the direction of securing all such undertakings by the authorities, aud in very few instances of the great number of municipal halls erected in New Zealand can it be shown that the undertaking does not pay. Nobody denies that a hall for Foxtou is required, aud few but those interested financially in other proposals will quibble at the venture being undertaken by the municipality, while the site proposed is the best one available, besides being borough property. Therefore, the only question open for serious discussion is : Is the proposed amount to be expended likely to make the hall an unpayable venture aud so become a burden on the ratepayers ? Reference to the figures quoted by the Mayor should at once dispel this doubt, and even if the worst happens and lean years are experienced, the deficit should not exceed £SO per annum. This is such a paltry matter that it is hardly worth consideration, and who will deny that the benefits to be derived from the possession of such a building as is proposed will be worth twice that sum to the town. Has it ever occurred to you, sir, that the opposition to Foxtou municipal enterprise comes from the same quarter on all occasions, and principally from ratepayers who have made comfortable fortunes out of the general public. These are always the first to cry out if there is the slightest possibility of a further small call upon their fat bank balances to help the town to become a little more fit to live in aud life to the average townsman a little more bearable. These half a dozen patriotic citizens could, by clubing together, pay i!i.' ; h ;ntom deficit they so gloomily predict and hardly know that they had done so. Let not the small ratepayer be led away by these gloomy croakers, but vote in a solid mass to give the town a start in the race in which it has so far fallen behind. His Worship truely said that the backblocks was the proper place for these penny wise and pound foolish persous„and Foxtou has a few who never would be missed. —I am, etc., Awaiiou.