The Taihape Daily Times AND WAIMARINO ADVOCATE THURSDAY, MAY 18, 1916. THE TAIHAPE HOUSE FAMINE.

Taihape Daily Times, Volume 8, Issue 117, 18 May 1916, Page 4

The Taihape Daily Times AND WAIMARINO ADVOCATE

THURSDAY, MAY 18, 1916. THE TAIHAPE HOUSE FAMINE.

(With which is incorporated The Tai bape Post and Waimarino Kews.)

The extreme need for more houses in this town, which we drew attention to some time ago, is becoming more and more pressing. Working people rush about from place to place, from owner to agent and to the newspaper office many of whom have been doing so for months, without finding a place wherein to lay their heads. Many friends of the houseless ones are generously placing a room, at their disposal very much to their own inconvenience and not always in the best interests of health. They have advertised for one room or two rooms, but mostly with disappointment, as everybody having rooms hav e let them long ago. When a house becomes vacant the owner has a long list of applicants from which to make a selection. Say it is a house at seventeen shillings and sixpence a week rent, the owner passes over men who are earning less than four pounds because he knows with the present cost of living the slightest, misfortune would render them unable to keep their rent paid. Those who are earning above four pounds and have employment of a permanent character, mostly have a little money that enables them to secure a place of their own. Then, that brings us to the exact class of house that is most in need and of which there is the least likelihood of supply, unless something is done that will induce men with money to build. The house wanted is first a four-room-ed cottage at not more than twelve shillings and sixpence a week. As conditions are, nobody will build such houses, but the town needs them and it is going to stagnate or remain where it is if they are not provided. Businesses cannot grow, the town's volume of trade cannot increase, there will be no demand for building sections, land cannot grow in value without the closer' settlement that brings with it the unearned increment, as it is called. Many of the pioneers of this town are still with us; will they see their splendid work of town-building nipped in the bud? They may have the pleasure in their lifetime of seeing a Taihape of from

five to ten thousand inhabitants if on- . ly they can overcome this need for houses that blocks the way to fur- | ther progress. We trust they won't think they have done their all in making Taihape what it may be in their life time, but that they will take the pressing question into serious consideration and give support to all practical efforts and suggestions that may assist in overcoming what is strangling the town's progress. Because it is a something that comfortably housed people do not readily recognise or feel, it is, nevertheless, a want that it is of the utmost and vital importance which should be supplied. Let it be well understood that Tai-

hape is not undergoing an experience that i s entirely novel, for other towns have been placed very much in slmilar straits. Some have faced the difficulty they were menaced with and are now large prosperous centres; others that drifted are little better now than before. Taihape's progress is now at the cross reads, one leads | on, the other is a blind street, which . are we going to take? Let us realise that we cannot have more boot buyers, clothing buyers, meat and provision buyers, increased business for the professions if we refuse tc acknowledge the fact that we must find houses for people who are anxious to live here and who are without the means to build houses of their own. Above everything else this town needs a good workingman influx; business houses are already more than equal to supplying our needs; we want more cf the customer class, but we fail to lock about for the means cf housing them. It is a very questionable undertaking to* purchase a cow or a horse, however much one may need such an animal, if he has neither stall or paddock in which to accommodate it, and it is just as impossible for Taiape to have an increased population business progress and civic importance generally unless its commercial and moneyed men evolve some scheme for furnishing the necessary houses to live in. This housing question has been handled in a practical and profitable way as the past history of some other communities proves, ind there seems to be no real reason why the Taihape pionoers and townbuilders should not promptly set to work and effectually remove the block that stands in the way of their nurse'insf's further development, growth ind progress. We may be asked why the newsDaper d~es not indicate how the shortage may be overcome; but -> s will not permit that chall-

-.- v'iii considered in to-morrow's issue, when one or two suggestions will be made and discussed. This daily turning away of population is too serious a matter for townspeople to regard lightly.