FORESTS NOT WANTED

Sun (Auckland), Volume II, Issue 597, 25 February 1929, Page 13

FORESTS NOT WANTED

FARM PREFERRED DEPUTATION TO MINISTER (Prom Our Oicn Correspondent) RAETIHI, To-day. A deputation of Karioi settlers and others waited upon the Hon. W. B. Taverner, Minister in Charge of Forestry, and Mr. F. Phillips Turner. Director of the State Forest Service, at National Park railway station on Saturday before the Minister left for Taupo. The speakers, Messrs. N. Littlewood, C. Lynch and D. Strachan. were introduced by Mr. Frank Langstone. They asked that the Karioi Estate be subdivided for farming and that forestry work be not further proceeded with. They urged the Minister to visit the locality in company with the Minister of Lands. Mr. Taverner gave a sympathetic hearing, promising to visit the estate with the Hon. G. AV. Forbes, as soon as convenient. The Minister was emphatic that the cost of the work already done by the Forestry Department would have to be repaid to that department. Mr. F. Crocker, chairman of the Kaitieke County Council, and Mr. Hill, county clerk, together with Messrs. A. B. Harris, chairman, C. Ball and D. Strachan. members of the "Waimarino

County Council, formed a deputation to the Minister regarding the expenditure due from profits on timber. The Minister promised investigations, believing that local bodies were better qualified to know the requirements of the locality than the conservator of forests.