CORRESPONDENCE.

Temuka Leader, Volume 2, Issue 122, 19 February 1879, Page 2

CORRESPONDENCE.

[We do not hold ourselves responsible for the opinions expressed by our correspondents.] (TO TIIE EDITOR OF THE TEMUKA LEADER.] Sir, — I wonder no one has publicly drawn the attention of the Geraldine Road Board to the ridiculousness of their attitude towards the Eangitata Traffic Bridge question. The Geraldine County Council are somewhat to blame for giving the Board the opportunity to commit an absurdity, but the Council may be excused on the ground that they could not foresee that the opportunity would be so promptly seized. The Council, at its first meeting, read a letter from the Chairman of the Ashburton County Council recommending that a committee should bo appointed to confer with a committee of the Ashburton Council as to the steps to ho taken regarding the bridge. The Geraldine Council resolved to refer their correspondent to the Chairmen of the Geraldine and Mount Peel Road Boards. Hero was one blunder. That resolution, as so much said and done before it was passed, shows what ignorance prevails of the Counties Jaw. What has a road board — any road board —to do with the Kangitata bridge now that it is part of a county road ? Nothing at all in respect of such a matter as this. I do not see how the Ashburton County Council could have avoided referring to the two road Boards as recommended Flour Council, but they must have known that in doing so they were doing an act of mere courtesy. How differently the two Boards dealt; with the letters received. Taking the resolutions passed on the sub ject at the last meeting of each Board to indicate the real character of each Board, how strongly docs the straightforward unselfishness of the Mount Pod Board contrast wifii the narrowmindedness ot the other. To bo sure, the polite reply of the Mount Peel Board to the Ashburton Council’s communication has no legal value, hut it is humanly gratifying. The reply of the Geraldine Board, on the other hand, is neither the one nor the other. It is almost sublime in its ignorant assumption. The Chairman of this Board (who was lately also Chairman of the County Council) was not present at the meeting at which the resolution referred to was passed, hut I am inclined to believe, from his well-known energy and interest in road hoard and county matters, that he must have been aware of what was to ho done, if not indeed the prime mover ; and I am the more inclined to believe this because the tenor of the resolution tallies exactly with that of the. quesiion Mr PoslTcthwaiio put to Mr Vv akelielu on the occasion of the latter making his post-sessional address at Geraldine. Mr Postlethwaito asked Mr Wakefield, as the Road Board now asks the Ashb urlon Comity Council, whether the G-craldine Road Board is liable i o he called upon to contribute to the cost, of the repairs. This is another instance of how much local jealousies can blind a man. Even the proverbial schoolboy, if not similarly blinded, would avoid tripping so clumsily. The Geraldine Road Board cannot be called upon to contribute a penny for the repairs, but the Geraldine Road District, as part of the Geraldine County will lose a portion of its usual subsidies, said portion being withhold and handed over to the Ashburton County Council in part payment for the work clone at the bridge. The distinction, as far as the cost to the district is concerned, is unimportant ; but it is not unimportant in this respect, that it precludes the Road Board from having the power to utter a single effectual word cither of approval or disapproval. If the members of the Geraldine Road Board or any other persons are anxious to have a say in the matter, they may acquire a right thereto in one way, and that is by influencing the Council to adopt the whole of the Counties Act. There is yet time, but not much to spare, for the Council to reconsider and reverse the decision arrived at respecting this point at their first meeting. A word or two on the separation question and I have done. If the residents in the Raukapuka Riding arc all so anxious to partake in the management of the bridge repairs, as some of them appear to he, they should “ go in” for extending their boundaries until the riding contained the requisite 200,000 acres, carrying the western boundary beyond- the end of the bridge, and then separate. The Raukapiika County would then hare at least a chance of having the management of tho bridge placed in its hands, and would certainly have (lie pleasure of paying a full half of whatever sums might ho expended upon it. Whoever, then, in the Rankapuka Riding desires to exorcise any degree of control over the expenditure on tho Rungitata Traffic Bridge, and to feel the burden of that expenditure as little as possible, let him or them urge the adoption of the Counties Act, carefully abstaining from any mention of the word Separation.—T am, &c., Talbot Forest. February 10, 1879.