CEMETERY EXTENSION.

Evening Star, Issue 8770, 10 March 1892, Page 3

CEMETERY EXTENSION.

TO THE EDITOR. SiR,-Referring to the leader in your last night's issue, please allow me to remark that 1 oannot endorse your btatoment that my opposition to encroaching on the Town fielt —be it for cemetery extension or any other purpoae-is contrary to •• the wishes oi the people really concerned." Now, who are " the people really concerned"? Certainly not the birds of passage, but those who have a stake in Dunedin and suburbs ; as also those, tc use a frequent I expression of Sir George Grey of " the unborn millions." If I admie that the City Council favors your proposal, yet its doing so does not prove that it is either justifiable, prudent, or striotly honest. The Town Belt has been committed to the Council to administer in trust in strict accordance with the terms under which it was dedicated, and it is clearly its duty to carry out the trust in Bpirit, and to the very letter. You admit that the Council has at the credit of the cemeterieß L 8.445 103 9d, but that it has spent the money " towards meeting the ordinary expenditure, and thus praotically to the relief of the rates." I am quite aware of this fact, that it has been illegally spending the cemeteries' moneys, and I hold that the Council should refund the same, together with interest, to be used in the purchase of a suitable site for a cemetery. Failiog this, let the Council, under Act of Parliament, borrow the purchase-money, provision being made for the payment of the principal sum thus borrowed out of the surplus to be derived from the new cemetery. I demur to the assertion that no suitable site can be obtained. I have heard of several; but possibly the owners might demand exorbitant prices. This, however, could be met by taking the land under the Public Works Act. My advice to the City Counoil, then, ia to look out for and select a suitable site, prepare and introduce a Bill next session, when I feel sure Parliament would pass it without any difficulty. I feel equally sure that no Bill encroaching upon the Town Belt will atand any chance of becoming law. —I am, | etc.. William H. Reynolds. \ Dunedin, March 10. I