ADDITIONAL MONEY FOR WATER

Gisborne Herald, Volume LXXIII, Issue 21922, 17 January 1946, Page 4

ADDITIONAL MONEY FOR WATER

PENDING submission of the further details promised, the public X may be inclined to reserve judgment on the Gisborne Borough Council’s notice, of appeal for additional money to that already raised for financing the Mangapoike water scheme. It would he as well for the town and its suburbs, however, if the ratepayers reacted sympathetically to the preliminary statement made by the Mayor, Mr. N. IT. Bull, outlining the new proposals and emphasising their apparent essentiality. . v This thriving and expanding district has been handicapped too long by an inadequate water supply. Each recent summer season has brought in its train an increasing series of worries caused by a shortage of the life-giving element. M ater tor industry, water for gardens and, above all perhaps, clean water for drinking is a sheer necessity in any community and the general opinion should ho that the council, having gone so thoroughly into the position and expressed a unanimity based on the advice ot specialist officers in whom it has well-warranted confidence, should be supported in carrying out the work now contemplated. _ borne of the extra cost lias been enforced by Government regulation; there can be no escape from it. Expenditure on concrete lining an the steel pipes, amounting to about £3IOO, is a case m point. The suggestion from the district medical officer of health, in. W. Campbell Davidson, that piping should replace.the open water course between the Mangapoike outflow and the present pipe-line is a sound one. Any effort to minimise the chances of pollution is very much in the public interest and should he regarded from that angle. The construction of a reservoir in Lytton road would be in keeping with developments in other growing, towns. i m provision of emergency storage is an undoubted requisite to modern methods of reticulation. , One of the main issues before the ratepayers..some of whom have complained of lack of vision in earlier times, is whether they are to tolerate a continuation of the deficiencies arising from < shortsighted policy or whether they will support the present council in making provisions which at last give a strong indicatio of conferring a permanent benefit on the community.