ECONOMIC OR PARSIMONIOUS ONEHUNGA?

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXVI, Issue 9371, 22 May 1889, Page 3

ECONOMIC OR PARSIMONIOUS ONEHUNGA?

TO THE EDITOR. S\iß,Sir Robt. Stout defines " economy" as " the proper and careful spending of money," '' parsimony" as " the withholding of expenditure." It is difficult to understand the course now being adopted by the inhabitants of the borough of Onehunga. For the past three years the town has been lighted by means of gas at a weekly cost of half-a-crown for each lamp, which afforded illumination from sundown to midnight. A demand has been made by the Council upon the Gas Company to again lower this charge, which has been declined on the ground that positive loss would be entailed by acceding to such a request. As a result, the town is now plunged into utter darkness, and the people have fallen back again into dependence upon such light as is afforded by the long-suffering tallow candle. Such a change—in the beginning of winter— when the whole lighting of the borough with eighteen lamps cost but £108 per annum is, it appears, one of " parsimony," rather than that of "economy." At the present time it is actually dangerous to travel through the thoroughfares after nightfall, and already the substrata of the larrikin element are crowded at the street cornersindulging in "horseplay" under the cover of the fostering darkness. The waterworks are now completed at a cost of upwards of £7000. The engineers have certified and the Council have accepted the works, and the latest resolution of the Council is to the effect that (although the mains and , reservoir are at the present time full) no connections will be made either to the inhabitants or provision made for extinguishing tires until next summer, owing to the bountiful supply received from King Pluvius ! Is this "economy" or is it " parsimony ?" The town has to pay (i per cent, interest on the capital suml—nol—no water rate being available until the Council are willing to supply the inhabitants. At the present time over £1000 lies in the borough exchequer, and a lawsuit is pending against the borough by the contractor for the

amount of his certificate, which lawsuit might easily be avoided by means of a fair and equitable adjustment of mutual claims (without plunging the borough into a costly lawsuit), which, surely, is the course indicated by true "economy." Ib is hard to see, Mr. Editor, into which course we are drifting : a complete waterworks, in which nearly £7000 of capital is sunk—now at compound interest, locked up, deteriorating—for fear of injuring the. directs in connecting the inhabitants with the supply ; and an extinguished gas illumination of our streets at a cost of less than sixpence per lamp for each night in the year! To commence a war with the Gas Company over a trifling reduction in the midst of winter appears lacking in generalship. The adjustment of rates might, so far as the borough is concerned, be more advantageously undertaken upon the advent of longer days. "Economy" is to bo commended ; but surely the above actions cannot come under that category, entailing as they do paying compound interest, depriving the town of necessary lighting, and legal expenses incurred, which have been of no "Parsimonious" character up to the present. In the words of Sir Robert, "'Parsimony' thinks the highest aim in life is to accumulate money; economy believes that wisely spending money, looking with hope to the future, is a higher aim in life !" Is not that true in Municipal as well as Constitutional life.—l am, etc., Onehunga. Ecoxomic-Commox-Sexse.