COROMANDEL INTERESTS

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXIX, Issue 21346, 22 November 1932, Page 12

COROMANDEL INTERESTS

FINANCE FOR ROADS

COUNTY COUNCIL DISCUSSION

[by telegraph—own correspondent] COROMANDEL, Monday

A proposal at to-day's meeting of the Coromandel County Council to transfer £IOO from the allocation for the Coro-mandel-Mercury Bay highway to the funds for the Thames-Coromandel main highway aroused keen discussion. Mr. W. C. Denize (Coromandel Riding) said that all its allocation had been spent and it was necessary to have funds to keep the road in repair.

Mr. N. A. Wells said that the Thames highway was in first-class order and the full allocation of £1027 had been spent on it. The Mercury Bay road was not in good order, while the bridges were in a bad state.

Mr. C. H. Simpson questioned if the council could transfer the money. There would bo such an outcry from those affected that the Minister would have to take notice.

The chairman, Mr. B. Dawson, thought it would be an act of grace for the Mercury Bay councillors to allow £SO to be transferred. On principle he was against any such transfer.

The motion was rejected. The importance of helping the primary producers was recognised by the council when a settler owning a large area of bush land on the Thames coast was given assistance from an unemployed camp to finish the construction of a road up the Waikawau Valley to enable him to cart fertilisers to maintain production on his hill country. The settler explained that he had recently felled 20C0 acres of bush land and his neighbour 500 acres and it wa3 to promote a better growth of grass that fertilisers were needed. Otherwise the land would go back. Satisfaction was expressed by the council at a telegram from the Public Works engineer that the Minister had agreed to provide £2OO from the Public Works Fund for cartage to enable the council to continue metalling the road from Coroglen to Whenuakite. At present a camp of single men is situated at Coroglen completing metalling on the Tapu-Mercury Bay road.