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Grey River Argus, Issue 625, 20 January 1870, Page 2

Ax the last meeting of the Borough Council the Mayor was requested to convene a public meeting for the purpose of eliciting an expression of opinion with regard to the treatment received at the hands of the County Chairman, in reference to the non-payment of the balance of the £1500 voted by the Council during the last .session for protective works at Greymouth. For some reason or other that meeting was not called, but a number of the principal business men have_ since taken the matter up, and in compliance with thoir requisition the Mayor has called a public meeting, to be held in the Town Hall on Monday evening, for the purpose of talcing into consideration the whole question of the distribution of the County revenue, $>o far as the original

subject-nutter of complaint is concerned, the largo balance still due to the Borough Council has been placed cm the, Estimates of the .present half-year, and this is accepted by some as a sufficient guarantee that the money will be paid, and that the proposed meeting is unnecessary, This, is. a groat mistake— a mistake into which the inhabitants here have too often fallon, of allowing the Chairman to do just as ho pleases with the monies vuted by the Connoil for expenditure in this district. If the matter is not i alien up with spirit, aud our representatives in the Council strongly supported in their remonstrances against past neglect, and in their endeavor to obtain immediate payment of the money now so long overdue, it is more than probable that the- balance of the vote will again " lapse," as Mr Hoos chooses to call it. If such a thing had been done to the Borough Council of Hokitika there would ha via been such an oxitcry, and so many indignation meetings, that Mr Hoos would have been driven or frightened into paying over the money long ago. But we are a longsuffering community, and have hitherto borne our snubbing patiently, but it "is time this state of things should come to an end, and it is to be hoped that the public meeting, which will take place on Monday, will amply demonstrate to the Chairman that our patience is exhausted, and that we must have, for the future, equal consideration and equal justice with our neighbors in Hokitika.