WAITEMATA COUNTY LOAN.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXVI, Issue 20366, 21 September 1929, Page 14

WAITEMATA COUNTY LOAN.

Sir, —In the Herald of the 13th inst. it was stated that the Gazette announced (that the Waitemata County Council had been authorised to raise a loan of £IO,OOO I presume this is the loan that the,ratepayers of this (Waitakere) riding refused to sanction a few months back. ' This loan is required to fulfil a promise made by the council to the Highways Board that the above amount would be found —a promiso made without consulting the ratepayers. Have these useful people any say in the amount of responsibility that is placed on them ? This is a poor riding, practically all gum land, yet already we are paying nearly ten shillings per acre in rates, and our local roads are. in a deplorable condition. We are told there is no money for repairs. The main highway is a through road, very little used by the residents of this riding. < Since the advent of motor traffic the rates have gone up 50, and in some cases 75, per cent. Of v course, it is no use the farmer grumbling; if he will not, or cannot, pay he can walk off. The Government states that it is out to help the small farmer —to foster one-man farms, so the latest form of encouragement is fo saddle us with a loan of £IO,OOO. Trying to mako up our rates will not leave us much time to grumble. But very little more of such encouragement will drive us into the ranks of that company the Government is so anxious to disperse—the unemployed. J.B.A.