Harbor Rate and Loan.

Patea Mail, 25 May 1882, Page 3

Harbor Rate and Loan.

At the public meeting called for this evening (Thursday), proposals will be made for rating the town and district. The rate is needed as a guarantee to he put in a bill asking parliamentary power to borrow for harbor works. If Patea wants a belter harbor, Patea should he willing to pay something towards the cost. Settlers living near the port should be asked to assist, in a lesser degree proportioned to the benefits resulting to their properties. Other settlers more remote from the harbor, and yet dependent on it for trading facilities, should be solicited to contribute in a still smaller degree towards the repayment of a necessary loan.

We believe a scheme can be proposed which, while based on a district rate, will not require a penny of that rate to be levied. We do not say it will be submitted at to-night’s meeting, but if such a scheme can be shown to be feasible, it should be proposed now.

A rating.-'scheme, however, is to be proposed to-night, and good reasons ought to be shown to country settlers, before their consent can be expected; and it should be clearly stated that the proposed rate is to be voluntary, and that it shall not be leviable without the consent of a majority of settlers within, the rating district. On this basis the settlers may be expected to weigh'fairly any advantages which can? be offered in exchange for the rate required. The bill will have to state the highest amount: of rate proposed to be levied. ’ Taking- it at yne shilling in the pound for the borough, the country district might. be divided into bcdts or areas for rating in proportion to distance from the port. For instance, land close to the town, say within three miles, would; be directly benefited in a high degree by deepening the bar, and enlarging the town with ihe increase of trade. This threemile area might bear one-half the rate levied ,in the town. A second area of three miles might be rated at onethird the amount of the town ; and a third area, say to the County boundary past Manutabi, but not going so far south: as Waverley, might be rated one-fourth. Public meetings should be called within these areas, to obtain the ; voluntary consent of a majority of ratepayers. If the highest amount in the borough is one shilling, the settlers may be sure that the full rate is not likely to be levied, but that one-half the amount is more likely to be made to serve for a loan, until the harbor has? been improved sufficiently to repay'the'cost. A sum equal to the other sixpence in the pound might be got from tonnage dues, by a slight increase in amount levied and by a-steady growth in quantity passing through the port. Thus a sixpenny rate in the town would mean a very small rule in the country, keeping in view the lesser amounts to be paid by country settlers as compared with the town. When the town pays sixpence in the pound, the outer belt of country ratepayers (say around Manutahi) would puy only three half-* pence in the,pound. , ,

To raise part of the required revenue by increasing the import and export dues is a sound policy so long as the increase does not turn the scale against this port at such places as Howera, Munaia,. and Waver ley. If a slight increase of charge would affect the comparative cheapness of this port as against others which deliver goods in this dis trict, then that increase would be suicidal, and ought not to be attempted.