FEILDING.

New Zealand Times, Volume XXXII, Issue 5081, 6 July 1877, Page 3

FEILDING.

(FROM ODB OWN CORRESPONDENT.) Fexlding, July 2.

The Manawatu Council held its monthly meeting at Foxton on Wednesday last, and after receiving the Chairman’s report, and also the engineer’s report the Council adjourned until next Wednesday, the 4th July. The Chairman in his report at great length challenged the accuracy of the items of expenditure in the Manchester and Kiwitea ridings that appeared in my last letter, and endeavored to prove that the Manchester and Kiwitea ridings were entitled to be credited with £4O less revenue, and about £SOO more expenditure than the amount appearing in my statement. The result of his calculations produced is, that, after deducting £4O on account of publicans’ licenses from the estimate I gave you as the proportion of revenue from the two ridings of Manchester and Kiwitea, he places the amount at £1655 13s. 9d., and claims for the Council that they expend for the benefit of the two ridings seeking separation no less than £llO4, so that instead of abstracting from the two riding more than £llOO, as stated in the estimate I sent you, the Chairman of the Council is jubilant over his ability to produce a statement reducing the sum abstracted from us to £551 13s, 5d.; and he seems to think because his authority was accepted for the estimates for the whole county, that therefore his authority for an estimate of the proportionate amount for the’ Kiwitea and Manchester ridings should be also accepted as readily ; but before doing so I wish to point out that he exhibits an extraordinary amount of feeling on account of the publicity given to the statements that have appeared in the newspapers, and that he has applied himself to the task of proving that the injustice done to the Manchester and Kiwitea ridings was less than stated in my letter, and he attempts to justify the abstraction of £551 13s. 4d. that has he acknowledges .been taken by the majority from the minority in the Council. The Council seem to act on the good old plan “ that they should take who have the power, and they should keep who can.” The way that the chairman has managed to increase the estimate I sent you last week by a sum of -about £SOO is original in its conception. He is not satisfied with charging the two ridings with the expenditure for working expenses for executive proportionate to the total expenditure tor works within the ridings, neither will he take two-niuths as the amount which would be based on tho representation of the ridings in the Council, nor yet the one-quarter allowed, with one exception in the estimate, which appeared in my last letter ; but he increases it to two-sevenths, on the ground of the county being divided into seven ridings, and therefore tho Kiwitea riding, with its rateable valuation of only £llO7, and the Manchester riding, with a rateable valuation of more 'than fourteen times that amount, are charged alike, and the ridings having two representatives in the Council are charged in the chairman’s estimate no more than the Kiwitea Biding or any other riding returning only one member. He charges the whole of the road from Awahuri to Feilding, £179, against tho two ridings for maintenance ; while no part of this road is within either of the two ridings. And he also charges one-fourth of the cost of maintenance of tho road from Palmerston to Bulls —a road that is four miles distant from tho district, —and yet he charges the whole of the maintenance of the road from Stoney Creek to tho Gorge against the ridings. This item should be admitted, and was overlooked by mo in my statement; it is put down in the chairman’s estimate at £110; and the Gorgeferry at £4O, which I also overlooked. These items would take £l5O off the county, and tho same added to the ridings of Manchester and Kiwitea, and allowing engineer’s proportion of salary at 10 per cent., would make the amount expended on the two ridings £622 13». 4d., in stead of £llO4 os. 4d, as made out by tho chairman of tho county, and instead of accepting his authority for estimating tho amount of injustice done at £551 13s. 5d., I think that it

fully reaches the amount these figures show it to be, viz., £933 Os. 5d., which is more than one-half their revenue from the two ridings. It is no wonder that they are opposing our separation from them while they retain their strong majority in the Council to make us pay more than the whole cost of the county executive at I’oxton. A reason employed by the chairman for abstracting the money from us is that the ridings represented by the majority in the Council are in more urgent need of work than the Manchester and Kiwitea ridings, while the reverse to this is really the case, but— When wavering self the balance shakes. It is rarely right adjusted.

The two ridings unfairly dealt with are nearly all covered with forest that cannot be settled on without roads, and the £933 forcibly taken by the majority in the Council is more urgently required to open up the unsettled bush country, and give access to new settlements, than it is required in the rest of the county, which, with the exception of Palmerston district, is comparatively open and free from bush, and therefore in less urgent need of roads to give settlers access to their homesteads than in h. bush country dike the Manchester and Kiwitea Hidings. There was a misprint in my last letter. The Kiwitea Hiding was represented as 50,000 acres instead of 500,000 acres, but I dare say the intelligent reader would understand from the context that it was a misprint.

I am glad to notice that Mr. C. E. Chamberlain, of Mastertou, has selected Eeilding as a place for erecting a flour mill. I saw Mr. Chamberlain leave the Corporation office after completing a purchase of eleven acres of laud, in a central position on the Kimbolton-road, near the railway station, for the site of a steam flour mill; and I have his authority that it will be erected and at work next autumn.

Mr. Charles Pharazyn, of Wairarapa, has followed in the wake of several other settlers from that older settled district. He has completed the purchase from the E. and C. Aid Corporation of 1000 acres of bush land, and will commence to clear some of it soon ; and will clear the whole of it at no distant date. Enterprising capitalists like Mr. Pharazyn will be welcome here, as they cannot use any of the land for pastoral purposes until they first expend money in clearing and sowing it down in grass, and when that is done it will yield an ample return for the capital expended, as the laud is fertile bush land, and there is no lack of labor here now for the capitalist to employ; and half a million acres of bush laud to select an estate from on which to settle.

A concert was given at the Immigration Depot on Friday for the benefit of the building fund of the school at Hnlcombe. The concert room was crowded, many having to stand throughout the evening. The programme, which consisted of twenty-four pieces, was most successfully carried out, many of the pieces being enthusiastically encored. The proceeds, I am informed, were more than £l9. Great credit is due to the ladies, who braved wind, rain, and mud to attend the practices. It is to be hoped the committee will soon be able to give another entertainment of the same kind.