THE PHILSON PROPERTY.

Observer, Volume XXI, Issue 1177, 20 July 1901, Page 2

THE PHILSON PROPERTY.

To be Discussed at a Special Meeting. Whatever the ultimate ibsub of the attempt to saddle the city with a debt of £9,800 for the purohase of the Phileon property may be, it is at least satisfactory that the City Council has paused a moment for reflection before taking the final step in the negotiations. The whole question is to be disoussed at a Bpeoial meeting to-night. Certainly, at the meeting last week, not one single Bound argument was used to justify the transaction. Probably, Councillor Hannan, who is one of the prominent advocates of the purchase, used the strongest argument when he Baid it looked foolish to pass a resolution at one meeting and resoind it at the next. But, to carry the argument to a logical conclusion, would Councillor Hannan contend that a man should not change his mind when he discovered be was wrong lest be might look foolish ? If such a principle was adopted by all our public bodies, we would as a community be committed to some very serious blunders. Better for us fifty times that all our councillors should look foolish— some of them generally do— rather than that they should fatuously persist in perpetuating their blunders when an error of judgment is recognised.

In this oase, some of the oounoillors do not eeem to have been aware thai the city bad already acquired a magnificent town hall Bite at a cost of something like £10.000. They voted for the purchase of this land under the conscientious belief that it was required for a town hall site ; and finding that the oity already owns a better site, they would be unworthy of the confidence reposed in them by the rater payers if they persisted in their mistake from the absurd fear of looking foolish if they changed their mindß. The only other arguments in favour of the purchase were that somebody else might buy the ground, or that, being adjaoent to the Art Gallery, it might be covered with shanties. So far as the first reason goes, let somebody else buy it. Surely that would be better business than for the people to be Baddled with the annual cost of nursing this useless baby. As for the second reason, no speculator who pays £9,800 for Buch a property will cover it with shanties. Unless he erects large buildings upon it, there is no possible chance of getting his ground rent back again. Consequently, there is not the slightest likelihood of shanties being erected on suoh a property. And, even if there was, surely £10,000 spent in pictures for the inside of the gallery would be a thousand times better investment than £10,000 laid out in acquiring an adjaoentr allotment simply from a sentimental fear that a view wbioh does not exist might be spoiled. The Art Gallery has been erected in one of the most unsuitable sites in Auckland, Why should we perpetuate this blunder by locating the town hall in an unsuitable position also, simply in order that it may be neartbe Art Gallery? Even the advocates of this purchase now admit that Wellesley- street is an unsuitable place for the town hall, and not comparable in any way with the top of Queen-street* That being so, why persist in the purchase ? Why, in view of the necessity to borrow a large sum of money for urgent works, jeopardise the whole loan scheme for the sake of an allotment the city does not require, and which is not worth, to the oity, the £9,800 asked for it. It would be well for the Counoil to remember the warning thrown out by Councillor Sticbbury that the loan would mean an additional rate of fid in the £. Sinoe then, the amount of the loan has been increased, them necessitating a still further increase in the rates. It is, of course, important to the progress of the oity that money should be borrowed to carry out necessary and urgent worksBut there is no reason whatever why a progressive scheme of this kind should be saddled with a proposal. to incur a large liability for land that the city does not require. It is a fancy scheme at the beet, a mere sentimental impulse, and can only be characterised as useless extravagance. Its effect, with other purchases that must follow, would be to increase the amount of the further rate that will become necessary. Therefore, it should not be endorsed either by the City Counoil or the ratepayers.