HOROWHENUA POWER BOARD.

Shannon News, 29 November 1921, Page 3

HOROWHENUA POWER BOARD.

PETITION BEING LODGED .1 HIS WEEK. At the last meeting of the Shannon Borough Council, Cr. Fargher inquired what progress was being made with the formation of the Hotowhenua Power Board in connection with the Mangahao Hydro-electric scheme. The Mayor (Mr W. Murdoch) said matters were going on satisfactorily as far as he knew. Mr P. W. Goldsmith, of Levin, was the secretary, and they all knew that he would take every precaution to see that things were pushed ahead and not allowed to lag. Cr. Hyde said he had spoken to Mr Goldsmith about the matter when in Levin last week, and that gentleman said that it was not going on so quickly as he would wish. The Mayor added that there were formalities to be gone through, and that took time when Government departments had to be dealt with. It would, of course, be necessary to hold an election later on to elect- a Shannon representative on the Board.

Questioned this morning as to what progress was being made with the foir- ■ mation of the proposed' Board, Mrtj Goldsmith stated that all the petitions : were in and that >he and the chairman of the provisional committee (Mr G. A. Monk) were proceeding to Wellington this week to lodge the petitions asking for the formation of the Board. With the petitions a map of the district in triplicate has to be deposited and these had been prepared by Mr W. N. Anderson. A good deal of work was involved in getting the petitions signed, one being circulated in the Shannon, Otaki, Foxton and j Levin boroughs, the Awahou Riding j of the Manawatu County and the j Whareroa Riding of the Hutt County, ! in addition to the Horowhenua Coun- j ty. These are now complete and sup-1 ported by various declarations. This information had to be advertised for one month and .that period was up yesterday, so that the petitions can j now be presented. The next proce- j dure, if the petition is granted, will 1 be for the Governor-in-Council to ap-; point someone to conduct the election of the Power Board of nine representatives, the Otaki, Levin, Shannon and Foxton boroughs, the Hutt and Manawatu Counties having one each and Horowhenua County three. He thought that the preliminaries could be disposed of before Christmas and the election arranged to take just after the holidays. Asked if there had been any delay in getting the petitions in order, Mr Goldsmith said the Manawatu County had caused some delay owing to it being undecided what it was going to

do, and this state of affairs went on for some time until it was agreed that part x)f the County would edme into the Horowhenua district. He did not think this district was behind the other districts that will be served by Mangohao so far as the formation of their boards was concerned. Certainly none of the other boards had been formed yet and Horowhenua was more advanced than many of them.