SEEKING NEW BUSINESS

Taranaki Daily News, 18 June 1932, Page 7

SEEKING NEW BUSINESS

TARANAKI POWER BOARD

A SURVEY OF INSTALLATIONS.

SPECIAL TERMS FOR CONSUMERS.

The monthly meeting of the Taranaki Power Board was held, yesterday, there being present Messrs. H. G. Ca-rman (chairman), R. J. Knuckey, N. H. Moss, J. Dobson, C. Foreman, C. E. McGuinness and H. J. Marchant.

The engineer (Mr. B. H. Goldsmith) reported, that the number of consumers at May 31 was 2164. Units generated during the month totalled 902,000. The largest daily output was 30,800 units on Monday, May 2. The maximum demand of 1800 k.w. occurred on Flay 3 and again on May 4. Installations connected during, the month-were as follow, the figures for the corresponding period last year being given in parentheses: Stoves 2 (0), water-heaters 1 (0), lighting and heating (new) 7 (2), lighting and heating (additions) 10 (8). An additional 6600 volt air-break switch had been installed at Midhirst in order to assist in. cutting up. tho district for trouble and interference location. Work had gone forward steadily in the Mangaotea cut and very satisfactory progress was being made. The work of replacing blue gum poles was in hand, and while this necessarily caused some inconvenience to consumers, it was being suffered cheerfully iu most cases. The Eltham' County Council wrote urging a reduction in the charges for milking motors. Mr. Moss said that he doubted whether the Eltham County Council was competent to discuss such a matter. It required a knowledge of the board’s financial position. Ratepayers might take it that if they could reduce any of the charges they certainly would. Mr. Knuckey said that members of the' county council knew whether it was cheaper to milk by electricity or by benzine engine. .The matter was deferred until after a. report on revision of charges had been received from the special committee. Mrs. J. F. Wells was granted permission to erect a concrete wall between her property and the board’s property at Ratapiko.

STREET LIGHTING CHARGES.

. The Eltham Borough Council wrote stating that it felt compelled.to reduce the present cost of street lighting, either in the cost itself or in the number of lights. It had been found that 17 to 20 lights could be eliminated, but this' was only a last resort. Application was formally made to have the cost of 100 c.p. lamps reduced by 3s and 250 c.p. lamps by 12s 6d, This would involve a total sum of £24 9s 6d, representing the charges for seven lamps. While that might appear only a small amount against the total cost for street lighting, added to other economies it was felt that it would afford a means of relief. The letter was referred to the finance committee.

The Cai’diff Dairy Company wrote enclosing a resolution carried at the last meeting of the directors asking. the board to defer levying a rate until its proposals had been formulated and circulated. Mr. E. Marfell wrote stating that he hoped the board would not again attempt to strike an availability rate on the Stratford extension area. Ho considered that should a rat© bo levied at all a general rate would get over any difficulty which might arise in regard to that area.

DRIVE FOR BUSINESS EXTENSION-

The business extension committee reported that in order to ascertain what avenues of extension existed it was undertaking a survey of the existing installations. A large amount of the data required was already available from the existing records, and was being tabulated. The survey would, require a personal call from an officers of the board at every property, and 'up to June I'132 properties had been visited. The information so far obtained was not extensive enough to enable the committee to formulate any very definite, ideas of the possibilities of extension, and the whole survey would take about three months. The conimitee so far had cohwiitrateu. on the means of extending the use of milking motors and electric cookers. It was recognised that under existing conditions extension of business on those lines could not be expected if the consumer had to face any heavy cost of installation. ’ln connection with electrm cookers the committee recommended that in the case of any consumer approved by the finance committee, a three-plate cooker with oven be installed at no cost to the consumer, the consumer undertaking to hire the cooker for a. minimum term of two years and a maximum term of five years. No charge for hire of the installation was to be made, but the consumer to guarantee to use a minimum of 12s 6d per month in current through the cooker. The consumer would have the option to purchase the installation at any time within five years, subject to a discount ref 10 per cent, per annum off the retail installed cost -up to five years. The committee recommended that 100 electric cookers be made available on these terms. With reference to milking motors, it was recognised that in most cases finance of the installation was a difficulty, and the committee therefore asked for authority to make special terms for installations to meat each case. As a basis the committee recommended tlrns the motors be hired \oi- use at a rental of £1 per annum, the motor to remain the property of the board, and that the cost of the installation and service lines be repaid without interest, by monthly or bi-monthly instalments amounting to not less than £6 per annum. The board had on hand stock which could be used for the installation of the cookers and motors, and for which there was no other apparent outlet, and it was proposed that the work be carried out by the board’s present staff. The committee recommended, that the board institute a lamp sales, campaign amongst its consumers, offering a set of four lamps consisting of one 60-watt lamp, one 75-watt lamp and two 100watt lamps at a, price of 14s 6d per set,, each purchaser to be allowed 2s worth of free electricity, and the payment tor the lamps. to be spread over six electricity accounts. Mr. Moss in moving the adoption of the report said he hoped that this would be only the first instalment of a, drive to get all the business available.