The Wairarapa Daily. THURSDAY, OCTOBER 7, 1886. MR RENALL AND HIS STREET.

Wairarapa Daily Times, Volume VIII, Issue 2419, 7 October 1886, Page 2

The Wairarapa Daily. THURSDAY, OCTOBER 7, 1886. MR RENALL AND HIS STREET.

Mb Remald convened a public meeting lust evening to consider the advisability of widening Renall street, and the action taken by tbo Borough Council and Town Lands Trust tbereon, and all matters arising from the same, Mr Renall has a perfect right, as an old settler and a leading public man, to take the opinion of the inhabitants of Masterton on this or any other question of publio interest, but thwe are reasons why, on this particular occasion, bo Bhould have refrained frooc putting himself forward as a censor of tbo Borough Council and the Town Lands Trnal. The widening of Renall Blroet must necessarily enhance the value of his own private property in the immediate vicinity of that thoroughfare, and consequently he possesses a private and personal iutcrost in the question at issue. We do not say that Mr Renall has taken action on private i grounds and that he is uninfluenced by considerations of public utility, but it ia clearly impossible to accept his statements as unprejudiced and impartial opinions. Again, if it were desired to obtain averdict from the publio, on this particular question, the proper course to have been ;pursued would have been to have invited the Mayor of the Borough, or the chairman of the Town Lands Trust to convene a, mesting to consider it. Had such a meeting been called, the Borough Council or the Town Lands Trust, as the onse might be, would have been morally bound to accept the decision to which it might have arrived; bnt no such obligation rests upon either body as the result of Mr. fienall's meeting. The question of widening Kenall street is

after all a comparatively 'nmimportant affair. If we are to havo public me etuiga over it, why should we not have similar fratherings over Mud Alley, the Perry street projection, the Dixon street protuberance, and othet highways and byways, which are in a more or less unsatisfactory state. • Can we not trust the Borough Councillors and the lown Lands Trustees, as our elected representatives to do all that can be accomplished in theso matters 1 We maintain emphatically that we can, and that in this particular affair of Rena'll street the Borough Council mid the Town Lands Trust deserve the hearty lliauks and the full confidence of the burgesses. Both bodies have displayed a sincere desire to widen this half chain approaoh to RenallvilJo and Woodroffeville, but tbeiranxiety to make a palpable improvement to a minor street hue been tempered by a sense of their responsibility to the public and to their obligations to other parts of the town. The Town Lands Trußt havo acted liberally in offering land required for widening the street at half its value, aud tho Borough Council is endeavoring to do its. part towards completing the work at a reasonable cost *o the public. We do not believe that either the members of the Borough Council or tho Town Lauds Trust will allow themselves to be cither dissuaded from the task which they have undertaken, or per. suaded into accomplishing it on other lines than those which thoy havo already laid down. The best public men in Masterton are in their ranks, and we do not for one moment believe that the residents of the district doubt either their judgment or capacity to determine a small allair of this kind. Mr Renall, by his meeting last night, has stirred up a lively interest in the administrative conduct of the Borough Council and Town Lands Trust. In the course of a few days the Mayor of Masterton proposes to call a public meeting, and no doubt at that gatheriug the other side cf the Renall Street question will be submitted, Mr Caselberg, like Mr Renall, has an unquestioned right to couvene a public meeting, and bo'possesses two udvimtagea which ought to weigh with the public. In the first place he is the responsible administrator of the public business of Uie town, and in the second he has no private or porsoual interest in the Renall Street improvement. Greater weight must necessarily be attached to the verdict of Mr Caselberg's meeting than can fairly be accorded to last night's assemblage.