Eighty-five signatures out of one hundred, the requisite number needed to complete tho petition to His Excelleney the Governor, praying that Westport may be incorporated as" a municipality, have been obtained from boiitt fide householders. A fact that should convince the few wavering minds still hesitating, and doubting between public duty and personal interests, that longer delay in signing the document is puerile and petty in the extreme. Admitting the impending necessity for the removal of Westport to a permanent site; anticipating, moreover, that the Nelson Government, admittedly as deeply interested in the matter as the people of "Westport themselves, will take prompt action therein; it surely behoves each individual member of this community, animated by a single spark of public spirit, to join hand in hand with those seeking" to arouse *an interest in local public affairs, too long dormant, to the very manifest disadvantage of the town and its surroundings. Tt might possibly have been more satisfactory to many to have seen the experiment of local government in Westport commenced on a less ambitious scale ; to have give)), in fact, a fair trial to the working of the Town Improvement Act, as a measure ostensibly devised for the express necessities of the place. But a little consideration has shown that, however praiseworthy may have been the intentions of the originators of the Improvement Act, they have defeated their intent by an excess of cautiousness. Tho powers conferred for raising revenue are so limited as to be practically useless in Westport. We fear the Nelson Twopenny Act, as it is familiarly termed, will be strangled in its birth by the very care of its foster nurses. To limit the power of levying rates on property to the sum of twopence in the pound per annum, on the assessed value of property, would he of no possible use in Westport. Any public works of practical value will necessitate at the outset a comparatively liberal expenditure of money, and hence it has been deemed expedient to adopt at once a memorial praying for the extended powers granted under the Municipal Ordinances. It may be, in fact it is, argued that the expense of Municipal institutions seriously curtail their usefulness; but the plea has little actual founda tion in truth. Some of the oldest established country Municipalities in New Zealand are models of inexpensive and effective management of public business, and the question of cost in Westport will in a great measure depend upon the expressed wishes of the ratepayers. It might perhaps be well to yet publicly discuss the question in all its points and bearings, although, judging from results of previous public meetings in Westport on similar subjects, they have served no end except to arouse mischievously obstructive propensitiesi
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Westport Times, Volume VI, Issue 977, 7 June 1872, Page 2
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459Untitled Westport Times, Volume VI, Issue 977, 7 June 1872, Page 2
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