PUBLIC BUILDINGS.

Manawatu Standard, Volume LVI, Issue 248, 17 September 1936, Page 8

PUBLIC BUILDINGS.

£1,215,000 TO BE SPENT,

A BIG INCREASE

A striking increase in the expenditure proposed for public buildings and institutions is shown in this year’s Public Works Estimates. It will amount to £1,215,000, compared with £346,880 spent last year. The proposed votes under the various sections, with the amounts 6pent last year, are as follow:

The largest individual item under the heading of public buildings is £40,000 on account of new departmental buildings at Wellington, on which £390,000 is ultimately to be spent. Next in importance is £36,969 for the National Art Gallery and Dominion Museum. The sum of £IO,OOO is provided for additions to the veterinary laboratorv at Walla.ceville. A similar amount to be voted on account of new public buildings at Auckland, finally to cost £120,000. A courthouse at Christchurch receives a vote of £40,000, at Blenheim £20.000, and another at Invercargill £22,000. MONEY FOR SCHOOLS. Under the heading of education buildings £202,000 is to be spent on public scnools compared' with £81,002 spent last financial year. Secondary schools are to have £IOO,OOO spent on them (£22,195 last year), and technical schools £117,000 (£58,192 last year). Native schools will have £14,000 (£BOB3 last year), and university colleges. £129,600 (nothing last year). Schools for the deaf and feeble-minded will have £2OOO and £7OOO respectively. Prison buildings and works mostly involve expenditure on small facilities of one kind and another. The largest item under the Post and Telegraph section is the provision of £120,000 on account of the new Dunedin post office, which will cost altogether £330,160. The additional storey on the General Post Office, Wellington, which is' to cost £13,500, has £6OIO this year, £4179 being spent there last year. The mental hospitals estimates include the expenditure of £18,500 on a butchery, bakehouse and kitchen at Porirua, and £20.000 on a new boilerhouse. The erection of a store block will involve £II,OOO. The erection of new buildings and the provision of facilities at other mental institutions absorbs the rest of the vote. The Dunedin Obstetric Hospital is to have a further £13.000 toward the total cost of £20,000. Extensions to the St. Helens Hospital, Wellington, including a new ante-natal and post-natal clinic, will cost £2OOO.

Public buildings— 1936-37 £ Vote expended. 1935-36 £ General 105,000 39,533 Courthouses 32,000 8,701 Education 500,000 122,357 Prison buildings 8,000 .2,123 Police stations ... 26,500 6,710 Post and Tel. 300,000 97,800 Mental hospitals 213,000 67,465 Health and hospital institutions 30,500 2,191 Total ...£1,215,000 £346,880