OUR LETTER BOX.

Bay of Plenty Times, Volume XXXVIII, Issue 5488, 23 March 1910, Page 2

OUR LETTER BOX.

\We are not responsible for opinions expressed by correspondents). IST REPLY TO MR DAVIDSON. do the Editor).

Sir.— l am pleased to have Mr Davidson's reply to my letter in your issue of 18th inst, and as I have his example of good taste and good humour I feel, a greater freedom in replying to his remarks. lam sorry he has been surprised. In hU second paragraph he says " Mr Lochhead knows, everyone knows, that the County Council receive a qnid pro qno for the works he refers to." Now, Sir,- Mr Davidson makes use of his position as Chairman of the County Council to make known extraordinary business, why does he not let the ratepayfeM know the ordinary business of his Council I don't know, nor hive I met anyone who does know, what the County Council received for the bridge built, and cutting made on Mr .Davidson's property, nor what they cost, but we want to know. He next refers to my rates. I have lcoked up my receipts and I find I have them all but the one for the year ending 3 1st inst., and 1 hope to have it by that date Of course I am not so conversant with Government loans,' Government grants aud Government subsidies a«» Mr Davidson, but if he \vi 1 kindly let me know of anything spjecnl, whereby I can help him and his Council, I wi'l endeavour to do so, even if I pay 10 per cent. Be working bee on by-road in ques tion, I do not know Mho organised the bee, nor did I know anything about i it until they had worked down as far as my place. When I found what was being done, I and my son went to work; I also paid the man with the team of horses in the grader. He said I had done more than my share I know Mr Davidson wa9 absent ; 1 don't know whether he paid anything. The next time the worst hill got into a bad state I and my sons rounded it up. Mr Davidson informed me that there had been complaints about me doing the work without permission, bat that he had got me out of the difficulty by saying I had done good work. The next work that was done on the road was by Mr Davidson ploughing up the sides of the road, to* save him self from the penalties of the Noxious Weeds Act He did it so effectively that he only lefc us a big water- course down the middle of the road to get along the- best way we conld. ( Of course he gave himself permi/ssipn>; it, did not matter about others he was the great " lam" of Te Puna When asked if he would get the grader, and have the road rounded up, he replied ha hoped to do so. I believe he is still hoping ; so we all are (that is two years ago) still hoping. In the next few paragraphs Mr Davidson flounders about in such a manner that one is inclined to think that instead of jam he is jambed The Council referred my application t) the Te. Puna Separate Bate Committee. Mr Davidson told me there was no such committee, then in his lttter he claims to be the Separate Rate Committee, self constituted of course.

Ye ratepayers of Te Puna, listen. Tour great representative has given your " road subject a considerable amount of thought," and he has come to the conclusion that you cannot bear a rate, at least only a very little one. He assumes he is correct because we do not hand over our rates, to bo used at his own sweet will. I never yet met a man with such cool audacity as to ask the public to subs- ribe, or pay rates, and hand them over to one individual to administer as he thinks fit. It does not matter how much it may cost us for haulage over bad roads ; we cannot bear . a rate, our representative says so. Mr Davidson next proceeds to show cause why a separate rate committee should not be set up. What will egotism not lead to ? He cannot remember when he was first returned as coun - cillor. Well, Sir, he hasbeea so lons that his self' esteem has so obscured all other mental organs that he cannot discriminate between the "confident and respect " of his councillor satellites, and that of his riding ratepayers. He enumerates the portions of the district where the members of a separate rate committee would have to come from, in all five members. He assumes that these five members would follow the example of his Council, viz , meet, ! iprangle and do nothing I venture to think that were such committee formed they vyould meet probably once of twice a year, and devise ways and. means to h£vs our roads kept in better repair than theyxare by him meeting his councillors oncaa month, and what an amount of thought it would save him. " s ;

Mr Editor: I congratulate you on your article in your issue ofsjhe 18th re " Attempt to Block Progress." 1 have watched Tauranga County; Couu cil proceedings for the past a»teen years, and their policy has ever betStt to hinder progress in every possible wfry Thanking you in anticipation for aliuwV ing me so much of yonr space.—l am, ' TaOS. LOOHHEAD Te Puna, March 22, 1910.