COUNCILLOR RESIGNS

Rotorua Morning Post, Volume 1, Issue 34, 2 October 1931, Page 3

COUNCILLOR RESIGNS

PROTEST AGANIST ATTITUDE ON I TOWN BEAUTIFYING t Of . •* COMMITTEE SUPPORTS CHAIRMAN I ti. ■■ . •• - v $ TWO MEMBERS ALSO RESIGN FROM 2 WORKS COMMITTEE 1 i# Following differences of opinion between the Works Committee of the Rotorua Borough Council and other sections |jj. of the council, which hecame apparent at Wednesday night's j]r meeting of the city fathers, there was a dramatic development '• yesterday when the whole of the committee with the exception * of his Worship the Mayor, who is a memher ex-offico, tfend- *?- ered their resignations in a body. Two councillors, Messrs Al- « hert Smith and E. T. Johnson confined their protest to a re- w signation from the committee alone, hut Cr. W. Galbraith, who " is chairman of the Works Committee has tendered his resignation from the council as well. ig

All thre'e councillors yesterday ] made a statement to the "Post" setting out the reasons which prompted their protest, but his Worship the Mayor (Mr. T. Jackson) when approached, stated that he was not yet prepared to comment upon the matter. All three members of the Works Committee emphasised their dissatisfaction with the policy being pursue.d by the council in connection with beautification aetivities, and stated that they considered the tendering of their resignations the only means to register an effective protest. The resignations have so far not been considered by the council, and the Town Clerk, Mr. W. A. McLean, was unable to indicate yesterday what steps would be taken to deal with the situation which has arisen. Both Cr. Galbraith and Cr. Smith tendered their resignations from the Works Committee at the conclusion of a discussion of beautification aetivities during Wednesday night's meeting of the council. The Mayor refus'ed to accept the resignations in open council but yesterday, along with the resignation of Cr. Johnson, the third member of the committee, both gentlemen formally notified their intentions in writing. Mr. Galbra'th's Statement Cr. Galbraith, in a statement to the "Post" said that he was entirely dissatisfied with the attitude of the council and especially that of the Finance Committee, towards the Works Committee. Of late, the Works Committee had been over-ruled in all its proposals and it now appeared as though the council hardly re.quired the committee at all. The position was one for which, as chairman of the Works Committee, he was not prepared to accept responsibility and after placing certain facts with regard to the financial situation before the. public, he felt that the only recourse left to him was to tender his resignation from both council and committee and permit the ratepayers to fonn their own opinions of the positions. Financial Position When the council had framed its estimates for the financial year, Mr. Galbraith stated the sum of £2000 was allocated for street maintenance purposes. This sum had subsequently been reduced by £500 which had been transferred to Unemployment | relief in order to obviate raising fur- | ther money for that purpose. It was ! anticipated by the Works Committee j at the time, that although the mainenance allocation had been decreased, this would be compensated for to some extent by the fact that a certain amount of benefit towards maintenance might be expected from relief works. Over Spent This £500, however, had already been expended together with an additional amount of £266 which had been over-spent, and the committee had received practically no compensation in the direction of assistance with maintenance work. j The Works Committee had drawn the attention of the Finance Committee to the shortage of funds for relief work and had recommended that a loan of £1000 be raised to carry out uncompleted work authorised under the Unemployment Scheme. The total cost of this work was to be £6000, But only the supervision costs, amounting ro £900 would fall upon the council. At the same. time the Works Committee had recommended that the proposed work to be carried out on Rangiruru Street and the Lake Front should be deferred in tha meantime until sufficient funds were available. Instead of receiving the committee's recommendation, however, the council as a whole rejected the suggestion to raise. a £1000 loan for uncompleted works and said that this would have to be done out of revenue, while it turned round and decided to raise this sum by loan for work on Rangiruru Street and the Lake Front, in direct opposition to the comn^ittee's recommenHatJkm. Work Uncompleted "As we have £500 less revenue on which to carry out maintenance work in the town, I fail to see how the authorised work can be carried out," said Mr. Galbraith. "Work on 27 different streets has been authorised and most of it is uncompleted." In addition to this, however, at Wednesday's meeting of the council, the Finance Committee had recommended that £200 originally allocated to suburban footpath works should be transferred to unemployment relief in addition to a further £200 which was to be raised for the same purpose, making a total of £400. This meant that the amount available for footpath work would be decreased by £200, while as the council had already overspent £266 on relief work, the actual amount remaining out of the £400 which it was prepared to raise would' be only £134. This was all that was left to complete work for which authority had already been given, and Mr. Galbraith stated that on the funds available he failed to see how it could be done. Done Out of Relief So far as beautification work was concerned, it had been clearly understood that this was to be done under the unemployment relief scheme and that the council was to supply one regular employee only for supervision. In spite of this, however, at the present time there were three regular men and a lorry working almost continuously on beautification. These were all members of the council's regular staff who would ordinarily be earrying out maintenance work, and he considered that this was a position

\ which could not be allowed to cofl^ tinue. '4 ij f Mr. Galbraith also expressed the opiijion that the Mayor had beeh wrong in his ruling that the control of Mr. Tschopp's work was under the Parks and Reserves Committee. Mr. Smith's Reasons Councillor Albert Smith set out tl|e reasons for his resignation in hj^ letter to the Town Clerk, a copy'-oT which is as f ollows "I hereby tender my resignatiqia as a member of the Works Comm|| tee. My reasons for so doing are follows: — || "(1) That streets and roads aii|l any work done thqreon should be under the control of the Works Committee. »| "(2) That dual control of suth work is fatal to efficiency 'and ecernomical working. % " ( 3 ) That the ruling of the May® that the work under discussion shoulq be under the control of the Par|qf and Reserves Committee is not c&frect as there were three resolutioiis recorded in the minutes from thrfifc different committees. The last oira, vesting control of the work in tfe street at Whaka in the Reserves Coi^lmittee is not in order, as the tw|» nrevious resolutions had not beqj| rescinded. g§ "A principle is involved and^mjj1, action in resigning from the Works Committee is to protest as* a -lasfe-aje-soxt against the violation of thfis principle leading to a-waste of money which we can ill afford at this junj& ture." " - _J Suppy of Material Mr Smith stated that* he consid--ered the facts should be. placed bfifcfore the public so that they couip. form their own opinions. $ The recommendation from th| Works Gommittee which, the jpouncfl had deleted on Wednesday night dearc with a request from Mr Tschopp f® supplies of kerbing. The committel had felt that it could "not grant su^ plies of this nature, as it had no allocation for beautifying work, and it had accordingly instructed the engine er not to supply any materiajs which would be a charge upon tlise allocations of the committee. '£ Over and above this, the committ Jj) had cause for serious complaint the fact that regular wages men weije being employcd on beautificatk% work, with the result that ordina^ maintenance work was being negleefed. 'Members of the committee h^d noticed that at times three to four &£ j the council's regular employeesvwe^ engaged in beautification work.'**lt | had been understood from the+ begrn1 ning that this work was to be "dorfe by relief labour and that only orte regular employee was to be engaged as a supervisor. Planting Useless | j "The committee as a whole fjsfjl that it is so late in the season thgft any transplanting carried out will'lfe useless and that the stuff will ohj^ die," said Mr. Smith referring to Tschopp's work. • • Mayor's Ruling Wrong ijf. Mr Smith also reiterated his opnjfion expressed at the council meetiag that Mr. Tschopp's work should com-e under the jurisdiction of the WorJs Committee which was the usual bo^responsible for street and road maintenance. In his opinion, the Mayoips ruling that the final resolutiqn on tl£e minute books of the council, placiifg the control of the work in the hanfe of the Parks and Reserves Committejr, was wrong. There were two previqiifs resolutions on the books in connte|tion with this matter and he cp|sidered that both of these shofi^l have been rescinded before the fih$l resolution became effective. * f"I think the public of- -Rotoroa should be made acquainted; with jtle facts so that they may be able;|o judge our actions in tenderingresignations from the committe^. The fact that the committee is undjJtimous in regard to its attitude '?,%>- pears to indicate that there is sofii^d reasoning on their part." ..., ^1' Mr Johnson's Views Councillor E. T. Johnson; expressed similar views to those voiced by^his fellow committeemen. He also stres'sed his opposition to the principle "df using regular borough employees "for beautification work to the detriment of regular maintenance. ' "There has been too much made of this beautification scheme," he said. There is a place for it, and I agree that it is good up to a point, but I consider that the council is going to extremes, and in going- to these extremes it is apt to forget the regular work in hand — work for which the council is primarily responsible. Suburban footpath work will have to be left undone because money which was to have been expended for that purpose is wanted for unemployment purposes. Beautifying Society "I consider that the council is playing into the hands of the Beautifying Society to too great an extent, and that it is giving them too much at the expense of the ordinary upkeep of the borough. I maintain. that if we help residents to improve their frontages, in view of the financial stringency obtaining, that is ample for the council to do at the, present time. These other schemes can be carried out gradually as the financial position improve^. As soon as the chairman of the committee signified his intention of resigning I regarded it as my duty to signify my approval of his attitude by tendering my own resignation. I consider that that is the only way in which the committee can register an effective protest against the attitude of the councihr'