Should Hawera Borrow?

Patea Mail, 25 February 1882, Page 3

Should Hawera Borrow?

(from our correspondent.)

Councillor King is to move at the next meeting of the Borough Council, that arrangements be made for floating a loan of £2,500. This is a step in the right direction, for it was with this intention that the late Town Board got the town proclaimed a borough. They felt that without extended powers to enable them to borrow, their improvements to the town could be of only a meagre character. The income of the borough is put down at £IOOO ; out of this the office expenses are estimated as follow: Secretary ... ... £l5O Engineer ... ... 100 Printing, &c... ... 75 Rent ... ... 26 Inspector of Nuisances ... 20 Licensing elections ... 25 Set of books, stationery, &c. 20 One surface-man ... 100 Overdraft and liabilities; say ... ... 70

£586 Leaving only say £4OO for the improvement of the town in the way of drainage, street-making, gravelling, and other necessary works that will be continually cropping up. It is true the Council’s banker has allowed them an overdraft of £IOOO, but this is simply on the security of the present year’s income. If the burgesses do not consider a loan necessary, we would have been better off to have remained under the old system, for then we should have had an income of say £550, and our officers’ expenses, &c,, would have been—

Clerk ... ... £35 Overseer (occasional) ... 30 Printing and advertising... 25 Rent ... ... 10 Inspector of Nuisances ... 10 Stationery ... ... 5

£lls Leaving a balance of £435 to be expended in the same patchy manner as heretofore ; and having strangers commenting on the metalled state of the streets in comparison with the amount of trade done, and the thorough financial soundness of the place. Of course there are always those in a town who think that at whatever rate it is progressing, it is going too fast; but when one considers that the amount of building going on at present is not due to any outside help, such as Public Works expenditure, but is simply the outcome of natural resources as a centre of the most fertile district in New Zealand, and its position as the town to which all the produce will naturally drain for shipment by rail, whether the line passes beyond this next year or not. These simple facts should, I think, be sufficient to enable the burgesses to sanction the loan whenever a poll is taken. Should they reject this proposal, they have themselves to blame if Hawera does not take that position to which she has at present every opportunity of attaining, viz. the leading inland town in in the North Island,

In making my estimate, I did not include some £l5O annual rental from certain reserves ; but as the revenue derived therefrom can only be spent on borough buildings and improving the special reserves, they do nob properly belong to general revenue.