THE EVERETT ROAD RESERVE.

Taranaki Herald, Volume LXI, Issue 144086, 3 May 1913, Page 6

THE EVERETT ROAD RESERVE.

(To the Editor.) Sir, —The Forestry Commission have come and gone without giving those who are most vitally interested _ a chance to give evidence, no one getting any notice whatever until they were gone that they were sitting. This is not as it should be, as a petition was sent by all the settlers around about the Everett Road Reserve to have it cut up and sold, as it was a menace to the settlers on account of it being a seed bed for noxious weeds. The consequence is that all the farmers around about it get their land covered in noxious weeds every year as the authorities have never cut the blackberries and ragwort until after they have seeded. Last year was no improvement on former years, when the weeds were only cut close to the road. This year I cannot say, as I have not been to inspect them now they are cut. I asked the contractor what price he got for catting the weeds, and he told me £2O 10s, so if that is the case there are plenty of woods to seed, and every plant will seed next year with ■thousands of young plants doming on. Now, Sir, to show-the damage that this nest of noxious weeds has done to myself and neighbours, I am willing to •give Mr. W. A. Collis or Mr. R. C. Hughes £3OO to exterminate the noxious” weeds off my land adjoining the reserve, which I blame for seeding my place, for there were none on it six years ago, and I have no doubt my neighbours would do the handsome thing too. I make this offer as they are the two gentlemen who asked the Forestry Commission not to allow the reserve to bo sold. Also, I challenge Mr. R. C. Hughes’ statement that any settlors anywhere near the reserve are opposed to lie being sold; the fact being that every settler, without exception, signed the petition to the Government to have it cut up and sold. If the Inglewood folks cared about it, or used it? there would be some oxpuso for keeping it, but hundreds of Inglewood folks go up to the reserve on the mountain, but rthihk I can defy either of these gentlemen to say they have ever seen anybody'in the Everett Road Reserve that went tlujre for pleasure. 1, at all events, have lived here for over thirty-five years, with land adjoining, and have, never seen one solitary soul. So for a pleasure resort it is useless. The Mountain Reserve is our reserve for pleasure. There is also tho injustice to the settlers having no _ rates or taxes coming in, only on one side of the road; the consequence is that tho Everett Road has never been metalled, and is nothing but a mud road, whereas if tho reserve was sold they could raise a loan and metal the road. In conclusion, I think the settlers should manage their own affairs without the interference of outsiders. The settlers certainly should know what is best for themselves', and if the Inglewood borough does not object I do not see who else has much right to interfere!—l am. etc., H. B. CURTIS.