NEARLY £20,000 EXPENDED

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 664, 16 May 1929, Page 7

NEARLY £20,000 EXPENDED

Relief of Auckland’s Workless HOW MAYOR’S FUND WAS SPENT THE '•-Mayor of Auckland's Unemployment Relief Fund,” which was started in the middle of September. 1927. and which ha- totalled, with its Government £ for £. subsidy, almost £20.000 has been expended to good effect by the citizens’ committee.

A statement of xeeeipts and expenditure. Government audited to the end of September, 1925, details disbursement of the money over seven relief works of varying magnitude. Contributions by citizens (to the nearest £) amounted to £9,016: • flower day” and the “Mayor’s drive” yielded £623; the Inter-House Girls’ Sports Association collected £457, and interest on all this money pending its expenditure added £96. Sundry money received gave a further £6O. Therefore, in all Auckland people gave £10,252. Add the State subsidy and the committee had £19,783 to spend. Thiß is where the money went: The Epsom reserve, £2,516. Grey Lynn Park, £2,902. Western Springs stadium (not yet completed t. £8,853. Walker Road, £1,997. Road work on the Domain, Museum Hill. £736. Roads at the Domain path from George Street, £770. Domain fernery, £958. The committee gave £3OO as a donation to the Devonport Borough Council's relief scheme: £277 was paid

away in premiums and incidental expenses accounted for £143. With the exception of the Western Springs stadium all works have been completed and the fund terminated on February 19. The Government agreed to pay half of the Western Springs scheme, then estimated to cost £15.000. As the work has already involved £8,883, the relief committee and Government sharing equally, the State can be called upon for another £3,053. The original estimate of £15,000 will, however, be exceeded and expenditure above that figure will be met out of the City Council’s unemployed relief loan of £IO,OOO authorised in 1926 by the Local Government Loans Board. Another scheme now affording relief to the city’s workless is the Waiatarua Park undertaking, round about Lake St. John, Remuera. Money for this comes from the Waiatarua Park Trust Account, now standing at £B.OOO. The major portion was given under the bequest of the late Mr. R. H. Abbott, and the City Council furnishes £650 a year. Here, also, the Government has allowed a £ for £ subsidy.