A MATTER OF PIGS

Rotorua Morning Post, Volume 2, Issue 310, 25 August 1932, Page 6

A MATTER OF PIGS

LIVELY DISCUSSION AT BOROUGH COUNCIL MEETING There was a lively interlude at the meeting of the Opotiki Borough Council on Tuesday night when Cr. Shalfoon quite innocently remarked that he had seen a mob of pigs running on the -stop bank at the end of Church Street. He did not think that this should continue as the pigs appeared to be destroying the grass. He did not know to whom the pigs belonged. Cr. Hitchens: Now, your Worship, they're your pigs; what ahout it? His Worship assured the councillors that there was a splendid sole of young grass on the bank at present. Cr. Budd: Now then, your Worship, you told us that two rnonths ago, but you can see the difference between that section of the bank and the other at any time. His Worship said that he had taken advice from the consulting eng.neer and a Government engineer and they had advised him that the bank would be all the better for consolidation. Cr. Hitchens asked if it was not a breach of the by-laws to keep pigs there. Cr. Tabb (to Mayor) : Now you know as well as I do that if you wanted to keep a piece of grass you wouldn't let pigs on it. The Mayor: I would if I wanted to consolidate it. In reply to a suggestion by Cr. Shalfoon that if his Worship would erect a fence, the pigs would be kept off the bank, his Worship pointed out that he had given the ground and earth for the hanlc. After a certain amount of cress talk between councillors as to who should erect a fence, Cr. Hitchens suggested that "if you kept a lion in the borough, you would have to erect a fence to keep it in, not other people a fence to keep it out." After the elerk had read the bylaws dealing with the keeping of pigs, Cr. Budd pointed out that the council had sown grass seed with a view to grassing the bank, but it would appear that the money spent on seed was being thrown away. Cr. Tabb: I think the bank should be fenced. Cr. Hitclqens: I don't. Cr. Tabb: How are you going to deal with it? Cr. Hitchens: Get rid of the pigs. Cr. Short thought that after the money spent on the bank and the benefit derived by his "Worship he should keep the pigs off. His Worship undertook to fence the bank off and asked the permission of the council to plant native trees at the foot of the bank on each side. This was readily granted.