COUNCIL OR DIXIELAND ?

Sun (Auckland), Volume II, Issue 462, 18 September 1928, Page 13

COUNCIL OR DIXIELAND ?

Baths at Point Chevalier

RATEPAYERS WILL DECIDE TO-MORROW CITY RATEPAYERS will vote to-morrow on loan proposals involving 4630,000, for the filtration of Point Resolution and Shelly Beach Baths, and the building of new baths at Point Chevalier. Swimming men condemn the latter scheme, so far as the City Council is concerned, maintaining that it would be better left to private enterprise.

There will be two issues, as follow: (1) A proposal to borrow £7,500 for the installation of filtration and sterilisation plants at Parnell and Shelly Beach baths. (2) A proposal to erect baths complete with filtration and sterilisation plants at Point Chevalier at a cost of £22,500. Tho proposals will be printed on one voting paper, but they are entirely separate. Ratepayers and wives or husbands of ratepayers are entitled to vote if they are enrolled. The rolls contain 26,239 names, which is the largest number record, due to the inclusion of Avondale and Tamaki. Thirty-four polling places have been arranged, the main booth- being at the concert chamber of the „ Town Hall. Mr. P. F. Notley, returning officer, has a staff of 77 and expects to make the results known threequarters of an hour after the polls close at 7 p.m. Voting will commence at 9 a.m. WHAT SWIMMERS THINK FILTRATION PROPOSAL FAVOURED “NO MORE COUNCIL BATHS” Representative swimming men who were approached by a Sun representative this morning in regard to the bath poll to be taken to-morrow expressed the hope that the first proposal, which was to borrow £7,500 for the installation of filtration and sterilisation plants at the Parnell and Shelly Beach Baths, be carried. With one exception the swimming men voiced their disapproval of the proposal to build baths at Point Chevalier. This, they thought, would be far better if left in the hands of private enterprise. The exception was Mr. J. Enwright, president of the New Zealand Amateur Swimming Association, Auckland Centre, who thought it was Inadvisable to voice any opinion at the present time. For publication, however, he stated that up to the present the City Council had not consulted the centre in regard to the proposed baths. The proprietors of Dixieland, who proposed building baths at Point Chevalier, had not only submitted plans for the centre’s approval, but had made alterations wherever suggested. Mr. L. Brighton, secretary of the Ponsonby Amateur Swimming Club, stated that he thought most swimmers would favour the installation of the filtration plants at Shelly Beach and Pari\ell baths. “Unless these plants are installed,” said Mr. Brighton, “we are going to be deprived of the use of these baths. Even if the poll is carried it will be some time before the baths are ready for use. With private enterprise this would have been done long ago.” Mr. Brighton also pointed out that although the baths had oeen run at a loss in the past, there was more hope of making them pay with the filtration plants installed. If they were not put in the baths would become a drag on the community. Personalis” he did not favour the proposal to build baths at Point Chevalier. These, he thought, could be run ,much better by private enterprise. “All swimmers would like to see the filtration proposals adopted,” said Mr. C. A. Edenborough, secretary of the Waitemata Amateur Swimming Club,

“but few would favour the erection of baths at Point Chevalier b> the City Council. The baths had not been run at all well by the council,” said Mr. Edenborough, and he thought swimmers would get far better service if the baths were controlled by private enterprise. “The installation of filtration plants at the Parnell and Shelly Beach baths is essential,” said Mr. W. Batty, secretary of the Grammar Swimming and Life Saving Club, “but the building of baths at Point Chevalier by the City Council would be a waste of public money.” Baths built by private enterprise, he thought, would be better built and better controlled. Under private control the present unsatisfactory position would never have arisen.” We hope that all swimmers will vote for the first proposal, which is for the installation of filtration plants at Parnell and Shelly Beach,” said Mr A. L. Graham, secretary of the Parnell Amateur Swimming Club. Personally he thought that it \yould be impossible for the City Council to make baths pay at Point Chevalier. To make the baths pay they would have to be efficiently run, and he thought Dixieland Limited would have a much better chance of doing this than the City Council. In any case Dixieland would be responsible for this, and swimmers would have good baths available without any burden being placed on the community.

FINANCIAL ASPECT LOSS ON BATHS ADMITTED DIXIELAND INQUIRY REVIEWED Although much of the evidence at the Dixieland Baths inquiry held last November was of a hazy, un-

satisfactory nature —founded on a series of more or less conflicting personal opinions rather than on fact—the financial aspect was made clear by the production cf cold figures. Cr. J. P. Paterson admitted that, lor the year 1925-26, the tepid baths receipts were £3,086 Is 4d, and the working expenses £4,267 Is Id. At Point Resolution the receipts were £244 4s 9d and the expenses £329 2s 2d; and at Shelly Beach the income was £195 18s 9d, and the working expenses £584 2s 9d. On the other hand, Mr. E. H. Northcroft, representing Dixieland, Ltd., explained clearly that the company’s idea was not to profit from the baths, to increase the popularity of the beach where it had property. Obviously, he said, it increased its profits from these by increasing popularity. If the public foreshore was not to be used for private profit, then freezing works or coal companies could not build or have wharves on the waterfront. EFFECT OF THE WORK When the question of the effect of the constructional work on the beach came • up, the harbour engineer, Mr. Drummond Holderness, said that the baths would denude the beach of sand, but Mr. F. E. Powell, engineer and assistant chief engineer to the Harbour Board from 1903 to 1912, said that there might be a formihg of sand on the land side of the baths, but he could not see that any sand would shift on the main beach. Some phases of the inquiry into the moral aspect bordered on the ludicrous, and were characterised by a lack of definite evidence on the part of the attackers of Dixieland, Ltd. For instance, Mr. W. E. Bush, the city engineer, said that the council had no call to provide bathing facilities at Point Chevalier. He admitted that for a long time people undressed in the park, behind ti-tree. With a measure of skill this could be done.

Then Cr. Paterson, describing the councillors as “custodians of public morals,” said that it was not right for young ladies to go out of a dancing place Into a bath like that. CABARET AND BATHING After saying that a cabaret and bathing could not be run together, and that young ladles going dancing and swimming at the same time was not the right way to conduct things, Cr. J. Donald admitted that he had once visited a cabaret in New York, but he could not say that he had attended one in Auckland for the past 10 years. The -inquiry was given something to -go on when Mr. A. M. Laing, as a resident and ratepayer, declared that he was heartily in favour of baths at Point Chevalier, and that if the city intended to do nothing, and there were no other offers, the licence should be granted to Dixieland. Mr. F. N. Andrews, president of the Council of Christian Congregations, put forward a number of moral objections in the name of the people “represented” by the council’s 35 members. He was replied to by Mr. Northcroft, who said that Mr. Andrews seemed to try and support an illogical position. The council could not say that it represented the unanimous view of its congregations. It was obviously absurd. At most he was representing tho opinion of a few pious gentlemen present when the resolution was passed. GRAVE PUBLIC FEARS Mr. Northcroft added that many people had grave fears when they saw the council undertaking anything in the nature of trading. Night bathing had been allowed at Parnell once, and he knew that they bathed there at night, caretaker or no caretaker. In voicing dn objection against baths being controlled by a private company, the Rev. Lionel Fletcher went so far as to say that his council preferred the present unlighted, unsupervised bathing rather than private baths. He added that whatever improprieties were occurring on the beaches at present, they were not worth worrying “about. Lastly, Mr. R. F. Moore, who prepared tho design for the proposed baths, supported Mr. Powell in saying that the building would have no bad effect on the beach. Boiled down, the evidence against Dixieland, Ltd., consisted mainly of reiterated objections against the company running baths—because it was a cabaret company. This was answered by Mr. Northcroft, who said: “There has been a good deal of idle and unfair innuendo, but not a scrap of evidence, and if there had been any evidence the inquiry would have been flooded with it.”

Injured Man Recovering.—The condition of Mr. E. B. Fawcett, who was badly injured when the motor-cycle he was riding collided with a motor-car coming out of a petrol station in Broadway. is now reported to be satisfactory.