CORRESPONDENCE

Evening Star, Issue 14524, 28 November 1910, Page 3

CORRESPONDENCE

THE LOAN FOR PUBLIC BATHS. TO THE EDITOR. j Sj r ,_The ratepayers will bo called upon „n December 5 to neeent •to a loan of 610,000 for the purpose of erecting Turkish baths, warm baths, aud one swimming bfith in Moray place. As the proposed loan will be opposed and the matter necessarily remitted to the vote of the xateliayere, I ask jour permission to state certain facts and opinions which should be considered by voters. The City Council has Reevxal properties earmarked for the purpose of establishing trimming baths in the City. The value of these, I am informed on good authority, is l«tween £5,000 and £6.000. From this must be deducted about £2.700 paid for the .Moray placo site, leaving at their lower value a balance of £2,300. As the Moray place site is estimated by an oxpert valuer to be now worth £5,000, the Council has at its command property worth £7,500 for the purpose of erecting swimming baths. To this must be added rents which have accrued during the Lust twe years, and there is also a moral if not a legal claim on the City for the rents from those reserves which in former years have been- applied to other purposes. It is probAtly rithin the mark to say that the Peroneal has at its command, without asking for a loan, about £B,OOO, which it is in duty bound to apply to the purpose of promoting swimming accommodation available for tho use of citizecs. The co*t of the swimming bath, dressing boxes, and of the installation of apparatus for heating the water, now in course of formation by the Young Men's Christian Association, is under £I,OOO. Assuming that this sum does not cover Ihe cost of wails, land, and some other , details, and that £2.000 would bo needed I to inako a complete bath, the money in the hands of the Council is sufficient to build and equip four baths if sites are selected on land which has been devoted especially to the promotion of athletic pursuits. Apart from the duly of a citizen to try to prevent what he believes to be a waste of publh money, I have felt a certain amount of personal responsibility in connection with the proposal to erect swimming baths. 1 was asked two or three yean ago to support it at a public meeting. I agreed heartily, and to the best of my powers 1 did so. When later on I found that the Swimming Association had allowed themselves to be entangled in a scheme which w;us quite alien to their foundation, and had acquiesced in the proposal to divert much of the money needed for the encouragement of swimming to another purpose, I felt bound to protest against their action. 1 believe there is no more healthy pursuit than swimming; that it is a matter of great importance that every healthy boy and girl should be taught to swim; and 1 hope that one result of this discussion of the subject will be that a wider public interest will bo taken in it, and t'hat the Association will yet evolve a plan which can be supportel, unless there has been imported into the question a proposal which has nothing to do with swimming—viz., a scheme to provide Turkish and warm baths. The scheme adopted by the Council is objectionable on hygienic as well as on financial grounds. Financially it means sweeping away the funds accumulated foe the encouragen eni of swimming, an additional debt to the City, and the indefinite postponement of any plans for the establishment of new baths in different districts. The site proposed is a bad cut —sunless, smoky, and dusty. The closed-in bath is obsolete, because it is unhealthy. The water and air quickly become polluted. In no for.a of exercise is it move necessary than in swimming, when all the muscles are in action and the lungs are expanded to the fullest extent. 1 have been asked in a quarter which deserves an answer why 1 have taken up this matter. The question is capable of a cynical interpretation by everybody, but I trust that they will leave Turkish and other baths alone, and stick to their own special business. 1 hope, also, that the City Council may abandon the speculative commercial business it proposes to embark on—a business which might and might not be profitable, but which in any case- would involve rivalry with some of its own ratepayers. —1 am, etc., D. COLQUIIOUN". November 26.