S.C. HOSPITAL AND CHARITABLE AID BOARD.

Temuka Leader, Issue 2175, 14 March 1891, Page 3

S.C. HOSPITAL AND CHARITABLE AID BOARD.

The monthly meeting of the Hospital and Charitable Aid Board was held yesterday. Present—Messrs J. Jaokson (chairman), M. Quinn, D.McLaren, and W. M.Moore. Mr J. M. Barker sent an opologyfor non-attend-ance. The chairman welcomed Mr W. M. Moore as a member of the board, and in the course of bis remarks said the finanoes were in a very satisfactory position, a» alter paying accounts that day they would have a credit balance of £693, bat as there would be four months before they received anything, they would probably have an over-draft of about £SOO at the end of the year. There had been no great demand of late for charitable aid but there wsb rather a dark outlook, as there were now in the barraoki two or three large famil ie », * ho would probably be a burden to them through the winter. A quantity of correspondence with other b-arda respecting exchange expenses was read. One letter outward made a claim on the Defence Department for maintenance of a prisoner in the hospital a week—the first claim of the kind made by the board. The father of a girl of 14 who had been in the hospital for some weeks, wrote that the charge, £6 13j, was too heavy for him to p aTl _Ohairman and secretary to make the best arrangement possible. Dr oomerville submitted a list of requirements for the hospital :-The insertion of six Middlesex vantilators in the male ward, making window of reading room to open, cost perhaps £IOO 5 overhaul of spouting, additional downpipes wanted, cost, perhaps £6O. . t , Drs Thomas and Lovegrove were appointed honorary members for the coming year. The house steward raised the question whether law costs should be oharged to ordinary aecounr, as usual, as if so they would go to swell the maintenance aooount, on which the charges to patients were founded. The chairman remarked that the patients ought not to be asked to pay for law. ,-■> The chairman and Mestrs Boss, McLean, and Quinn were appointed a oommittee to prepare estimates for the ooming year, to examine tj>e hospital and barracks and asosrtain what is absolutely needed in the way of alterations and jefairs, _ Notice was giyan to move that the resolution re insurance be rescinded, and the building and furniture be insured for £SOOO. The board then took up charitable aid bniineis. ... . Among the inmates of the barracks now is a family, consisting of the father, aged 60, the mother, a comparatively young womarj, and eix children, lbs eldest a girl of 13, while a eeventb, a boy, is in the .hospital. The mother waited on the board, and explained that her husband could get nothing to do in Timuru (he is a dentist), and it was no use their goipg to a strange town, as they had no money, no furniture, and the children were in rags.—After discussing the matter the chairman was authorised to make inquiries in the direction of getting the man settled jo business elsewhere, _ liaao Hill, the borough poundkeeper, waited on the board, and requested assistance to go to the Dunedin Hospital in order to have his eyeß attgnded to. He had been in the hospital here for a month, ong the dootor could do nothing for him, There was a special eye-doctor at Dunedin, and he expeoted that gentjemau could do him some ?ood.—On the suggestion of Mr McLaren it was agreed to pay his passage to Banedin, on the understanding that if the specialist sajs he 6an do nothing for him he returns at once.

The ohairman wa« authoriaed to make arrangements for sending Home to Cornwall an orphan girl of 10 years namsd Williams, whone grandfather had written asking that she be sent. The girl is now " boarded out" at a cost of £ls 12s per annum.

Hoipital accounts,* £l3l 18s Id, and charitable aid account!, £134 8s Id, were pwaed for payment, and the meeting terminated.