MONEY TO SPEND

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume LXI, Issue 18484, 24 August 1934, Page 4

MONEY TO SPEND

COUNTIES PROVIDED FOR IMMEDIATE START URGED DISTRICT WELL TREATED It may be fairly claimed that the Minister of Public Works and also tho Main Highways Board have treated the Poverty Buy and East Coast district well, in regard to grants for road and bridge. construction, highways grants, and maintenance funds. During the current public works year the district may benefit by expenditure of public money for these purposes to a total of nearly £150,000, arid it behoves the local bodies concerned to lose no time in presenting their schemes for, disbursement of .the: funds, and. providing thejr-respective shares of expenditure where - grants, have been made subject to contributions by the county councils. In the matter of highways expenditure, the No. 4 highways district, centring on Gisborne, may spend up to £42,500 of board .funds in construction and improvement of. the main roads, and there are large additional sums provided for adjacent districts’ roads on which Poverty Bay traffic operates in some degree. The total of - these sums for construction and improvement is not.by any means all that is to. be spent in this area from the Highways Board’s funds, for another £56,000 will be available for maintenance, providing the respective local bodies are able to find their fixed contributions. ROADING GRANTS

In view of the necessity for putting as much money as possible into circulation, it is perhaps timely to mention that during the 1933-34 financial year, when £26,761 was voted from the Highways Board’s funds for construction and improvement of highways in the No. 4 district, only £17,523 was expended, owing to the inability of the local bodies to furnish their contributions. Likewise, much of the money set aside for maintenance remained unexpended, for the same reason. In tho case of ordinary Public Works Department grants, only £7430 was spent last year of a total available sum of £22,732 voted by Parliament for the Gisborne road district. One of the reasons for the improved level of Highways Board and Public Works Department grants for the Current year is, no doubt, that throughout the Dominion there was some difficulty on the part of local bodies in finding thoir contributions for roading expenditure. This is shown by the aggregate figures for the two divisions of roading grants in this year’s public works estimates. Last year the public works fund made £465,000 available in votes to the respective road districts, and the total expended was only £359,000. In the case of the highways fund, • for construction purposes, £260,000 was voted last year, and only £192,000 spent. These figures in themselves contain a strong argument in favor of early action on the part of local bodies. GOOD RESULTS PROM MINIS# TERIAL VISIT

On the general treatmerit received by this district, in the voting of public motley for expenditure in the current year, it may be observed that the recent visit of the Minister of Public Works to Poverty Bay and the East Coast has borne good fruit. It has been the experience in the past that only by personal contact with the district can Ministers of the Crown be brought to realise how isolated are some portions of this district. The first big impulse towards the provision of adequate road communications was provided by the visit of the Rt. Hon. J. G. Coates over 10 years ago, when the present Minister of Finance, then first-lieutenant to the late Mr. Massey and holder of the public works portfolio, spent an arduous week in the district, encountering typical winter road conditions. Subsequent Ministerial visits have also furnished good results in the matter ! of Parliamentary votes for roading purposes, and the Hon. J. Bitchener’s experience during his short stay in the district in March last is reflected, to some extent at least, in the provision of substantial funds for several works which have been urgently needed for some time BETTER ACCESS One of the works which appealed especially to the Minister, no doubt, was the provision of better access for the settlers in the Mata area, in the Waiapu County hinterland. There is a large scope of country'inland from the coast which in the past has been served only by a clay .road with difficult corners and some very steep pinches, and opportunity was taken during the Minister’s visit to impress upon Mr. Bitchener the difficulties of access suffered by the Mata settlers. The votes for the Waiapu County, in the estimates brought down last evening, includeed £4OOO for the TokomaruMata road, on a basis of £2 for £l, the county being under the necessity of finding £2OOO to carry out the work envisaged for the current year. It is proposed to reform, regrade, and metal this road.

There is also £IBOO available for the Ihungia-Mata-Waitahaia load, one of the longest in the Waiapu County, and onp of those most in need of attention; This by-road parallels the Tokomaru-Mata road, and affords access to a large number of settlers’ homesteads in good sheep country. Among other substantial grants for the Waiapu Cdhjty there is £IOOO provided for tne bridging of the Aorangiwai Stream on the Makarika-Matahiia road, this being a turbulent little creek which in stormy weather is subject to high flooding. The sum of £650 is furnished for the Poroporo Stream bridge, on the Rangitukia road, which has been the subject of many representations in the past; and £2OOO is available for the Wairorigomai Stream bridge, on the Tapuwaoroa road, this being a reinstatement of an old grant which was not taken up, but in respect of which some progress is likely in the early future. BRIDGES AND METALLING. In the Waikohu County, votes are available for work on the Makaretu road, and for the .raisin? above flood level of three bridges which have given trouble in the past, these bqing the Waihora Stream bridge on Bruce’s road, the Te Hau suspension bridge on the Waitangi road, aim the Mangatu bridge on the Mangatu road. On the Gisborne-Motu road, via Whakarau, £506 is to he spent in improvements, while some other works of less importance are also included in the votes.

The major grants made to the Cook County include the £4243 available for reforming and metalling a length of five

miles of the Hangaroe-Waikaremoana road. This work was instituted last year, and some progress was made, but the men were transferred as‘winter conditions set in, and a new start is to be made with the return of warmer conditions. There is £3239 made available for sealing work on the Mangapoike Val 7 ley road, between Manutuke and Reay Bridge, and this work is ready to proceed as soon as conditions permit. The Cook County Council has propped an extensive programme of works apart from these jobs, but the amounts involved are individually small. ' The Uawa County is to have the assistance of a grant of £3663 for the Kiore road, on which four miles of metalling is to be carried out this season. Last year preparations were made for taking up this work, as a relief work, but a shortage of stone supplies field it up, though a considerable amount of formation was done in anticipation of the metalling being carried on. The Kica§ road work - will include a deviation Wf 60 chains, part of which already has been done. Nothing of an ambitions nature is to be undertaken in the Matakaoa County, the new money for which indudes no grant over £l2O, with the exception of a sum of £1166, to cover expenditure already undertaken, on the Main East Coast road between Whangaparaoa and the Opotiki County boundary.,