TOWN HALL PROPOSAL

Press, Volume LXXIII, Issue 22112, 7 June 1937, Page 4

TOWN HALL PROPOSAL

TO TH* EDITOR OF TUB PKE33. Sir,—ln his letter on Saturday Mr Hiram Hunter explains h's strategy fofloating his town hall scheme. It has probably floated as high as it will go. Mr Hunter's critical comments upon my letter are mainly beside the point. His gibe at mv racial canninsss my withers unwrung; for it is directed against pnudence in public expenditure. To make our trams pay, to find money to maintain our public gardens, for example, are perplexing problems. Would it not be well to deal with such matters—and there are many more of them—before turning to splash tens of thousands of pounds to gratify our vanity? Emptv vanity it K though r» casuist may glorify it by the name of "civic pride." Mr Hunter's remarks about certain ecclesiastical buildings in Christchurch and other countries are not relevant. These cathedrals and churches are being use'! t*>-"n>»hout thp vpar alrmit daily and nightly. I question if even a non-Scottish community would build such a useless building as Mr Hiram Hunter contemplates. Mr Hunter has not deigned to comment unnn my suggestion that if *> town hall we must have we can find one in the Civic Theatre wW"h at * fraction of the cost of Mr Hunter's visionary town hall could be converted and transformed to meet the purpose. It is ideally situated for such a building snd we should then have all the municipal buildings in a large, handsome block. Will Mr Hunger object that that would be too cheap?— Yours, etc., CANNY SCOT. June 5, 1937.