PUBLISHED ON TUESDAY AND FRIDAY AFTERNOONS. The Times. FRIDAY, JANUARY 2, 1920. 1920 ENTERPRISES

Pukekohe & Waiuku Times, Volume 9, Issue 493, 2 January 1920, Page 2

PUBLISHED ON TUESDAY AND FRIDAY AFTERNOONS.

The Times. FRIDAY, JANUARY 2, 1920. 1920 ENTERPRISES

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Progressive schemes, as i yet in a more or less nebulous state, should show material fruits during 1920. Once the war was over and the-Feaee terms settled a wave of optimism spread over this Dominion, finding expression in a laudable desire by public bodies to initiate proposals long held in abeyance owing to war conditions. The Franklin County Council intends shortly to give the ratepayers an opportunity of sanctioning a loan for the purchase of much needed machinery with which to carry out road improvement works on a much-larger and more efficient scale than has -hitherto been possible. These proposals will probably be put into definite shape within a few weeks' time, and we have no doubt that the ratepayers of Franklin will prove themselves equally as enterprising as those of the Manukau County, in which comprehensive loan proposals were all carried by large majorities a short time ago. Before 1921 the actual work should be well under way. The Franklin Council also favours giving individual ridings the right to rate themselves for the erection of a limited number of cottages for the workmen employecf a long way the labour acute, because steady, constant contractors and clay wages men having families find it impossible to secure dwellings. This expenditure would be returned to the ridings within the course of a definite number of years.

rTnVPukekohe Borough Coun-r 'ell's loan schemes, for roads, drainage, water and lighting extensions, and maybe for a town hall, which projects have been alluded to in these columns frequently, should, though somewhat overdue, take practical shape in the very near future. Jf the proposals are judiciously handled, and the Council shews a united front, it js hardly likethe ratepayers of the Borough will turn them down. Such an action would bfrOl

deadly blow at the Borough's prospects, and would ultimately have the effect of reducing the prestige and status of the town as a centre for a population of about 10,000 people, resident in various parts of one of the most highly productive districts in New Zealand. The Borough Requires additional population, every new resident contributing to the general welfare and making the individual burdens on ratepayers proportionately lighter. In order to secure extra population, the health conditions and .general facilities must be very largely improved, otherwise progress will be, tively speaking, painfully slow. We cannot afford to tarry. In the Manukau County great strides in the way of road improvements are practieaHy certain to be in evidence, the machinery for which should shortly be at work. The ratepayers of Manukau have learned well the lesson that good roads are the foundation of progress. Besides benefitting themselves to a degree difficult to calculate the great extent of, their action will have a stimulating effect on the residents of other areas, resulting in widespread advancement.

It is also on the cards that Papakura and Manurewa will make considerable strides, especially in such vitally important matters as roads improvements, water and drainage schemes, thus making the total progress of Manukau cOmmendably striking. By the foregoing it must not be -judged that we have any faith in nonsensical " New Year resolutions." Resolves of this kind rarely fructify, not having in them the true seeds of improvement: human resolves, to be effective, must be the natural culminations of certain states of being, the inevitable unfolding of evolution, and not mere time-table, arbitrary decisions arrived at by the mechanical changes in the calendar. The present wave of progressive ideas is the natural expression of action long damned back by the hightide of war. The floodtide of war has receded, and lesser streams of volumes of life's activites may now resume their courses all the faster for having been artificially held in check. Let every man and woman, then, will and work for the accomplishment of things worth while during this aus--1 picious y»ar nt 1920--i : ?