The Town Lands Trust.

Wairarapa Standard, Volume XX, Issue 2065, 9 May 1887, Page 3

The Town Lands Trust.

To the Editor of the Standard. Sib,—l, as an old resident in the district, have noticed that there has been considerable excitement lately over the election of two trustees for the Greytown Town Lands Trust, and “ if I am in order " as they say at public meetings, I would like to know what the Trust have done for the town. They have lands vested in them but “ What are they doing with those lands ? What return are those lands making to the inhabitants of the place ?” As regards the reelection of Messrs Baillie and Haigh to the Trust, I have nothing to say against that. \o doubt they are just the easy going, stolid, one-idea men that are suitable for a one-eyed little np country township, and they are not likely to make much stir or revolution while they occupy seats on the Trust. They are men no doubt with good reasoning powers, bat their sense of reason is never allowed to crop up to the surface; they are always profoundly thinking for us, but beyond a certain air of mystery and wisdom which they assume, their projects are never worked out and are never likely to be. They tell ns that they will never allow the waste lands of this town to be tampered with, as is the case with the Masterton Trust, and 1 quite believe, Mr Editor, that they mean to stick to their text. They are not likely to do much with oar Trust lands ; they are content to see sheep quietly grazing on the ground at a mere nominal rental per annum, and would consider it a great innovation to receive a much larger ground rental for the land as building sites, as the Masterton Trust has seen fit to do. They tell us that the funds derived from the property of the Trust are principally for educational purposes. I would like to know what the Trust has done for education in this town, and what superior advantages have the residents of Greytown over any other country township in tbs colony, who do not possess Trust Lands. The present chairman of our school committee told us a short time ago that we “ were not up to the standard ” of other towns. How then have our Trust Lands and Trustees enhanced our position in that direction, and what account can they render of their stewardship ? lam not advocating new blood, which perhaps with the same cramped up system could nit materiAly alter the state of the present afffffrs, but I think it is high time that these obsolete and useless petty local bodies should all be vested into one corporate governing body without the funds being diverted from the channel into which they were originally intended to be directed. We have a Borough Council with all the machinery necessary to carry one and all administrative powers under all headings, and if our Trustees require still to work the “ humdrum ” business which at present comprises the duties of that body they can get I themselves elected on the Council, and j then everything can be humdrumed together and all in a nut shell, but I do not think we require so many of these miniature parliaments in our ■mall locality each having a “ mighty potentate ” as president. Then there is that other little absurdity, the W*iohine Fiver Board, that dictates to to.** Borough Council as to what rates th”y shall levy for protective purposes. 1 say, that we should ■weep awav ,‘bis funny little hokeypokey body and Jet the Council do the work in committee in a primary manner instead ot by dictation. I am, Ac., Out of the Btxg.