The New York herald. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1840-1920, 1874-07-15
! will show

iooo january l.........- ........... 40. 7s6, 030
1862 January 1...........,. .......... 81 POS 43O
blu january 1....... ..............-. &c. 040, 052
lSIl January l.............. ..-...... 91,4S3,446
SI@ January 1.......... ............. 93,607, 70S
100 JANUARY l................ 11S,Sl5 229
1874 January l....... NEUTRALITY-SUSPICIOUS.. 13l, S69 81
So during Mr. Green's term of Office the
debt had increased up to January of the
present year $40,00O.000 and the taxation
$6,OOO,O 600 The policy of providing for
the gradual liquidation of the debt appears
to have been abandoned, and in its stead we
have the new system of "bridging over by
renewing bonds as they fall due, by issuing
new stock to take up stock that has matured,
and BY postponing to future year the tax
alton that legitimately belongs to the present
year. Between January /, 1874, and January
l, 1875, the amount Of stock and bonds falling
due, and which should have been paid and
cancelled, reaches $40, 773, 5la Yet although
the appropriations for the support of the
are in gross s34,s22,3s1, the sum of
81, $50, 769 alone is set apart for the pay
mont of debt leaving over s22, 500, 900
to be 'fbridged over and still drawing
seven per cent interest This does not pre-
sent an encouraging prospect, but our fnan-
cial condition is even worse than these figures
make it appear. We have other liabilities
the amount of which the Comptroller, in his
policy Of deception and concealment, refuses
to Lay before tho people. This floating debt
consists of claims and suits against the city,
none Of which are embodied in the Comptrol-
lers debt statements although a large pro-
portion, with costs and back interest, must
eventually be paid out of the public treasury.
The Commissioners of Accounts were sup
posed to be engaged in making list of these
unadjusted claims in january last, but their
report has been suppressed The Corporation
CounsePs statement, made about that time,
showed that suits were then pending against
the city to the amount of $6,800,O0 and
$3.50, 900 against the county, making total
of $3.50, 600. The claims not in suit are
estimated to reach about $12, 900, 900, and
thus the floating debt of the city is doubtless
not much less than $40, OOO, 900. We may
probably hope to escape payment of half this
sum; but the other half, with back interest
and costs, will not ts!! tar short Of the gross
amount On March 81 last the debt, e.
elusive of tho floating debt had reached
$l36, 317,5O3 We have, therefore, at the
present moment about s156, 900, 900 of gross
indebtedness, and we are called upon to pay
nearly $35, 900, 900 of taxation tor the current
expenses of the year!
The departments whose appropriations have
been reduced are principally those of Finance
Charities and Correction, Public Parks and
the Street Cleaning Bureau The salary list
in the Comptroller's Department was cut
down $3l 900. 1t ought to have been reduced
500, 000 bat half the year had passed, and
the economy SO much needed and which will,
no doubt, be enforced next year, could not
now be wholly secured. The Finance De-
partments expenditures have been shamefully
extravagant. Under the most reckless year of
Mr.. Connolly's COMPREHENSIVE the appro-
priations for that department for cleaning
markets, contingencies and salaries was
1899, 737, but the amount expended was only
1882, 2S5, or over $55, 900 less than is appro-
priated this year to the department under Mr.
Green. The old hangers-on of Comptroller
Connolly are retained by Mr.. Green at exorbi-
tant salaries, and his own Office and the
bureaus in his department have been asylums
for his friends and followers, who have
virtually been pensioned on the city's
treasury. The entire expenditure of the de-
partment should not be over $3.50, 900 at the
outside. The Department of Charities and
Correction, which was cut down about
500, 900, if honestly administered could be
run for quarter of a million less than is now
squandered on it Grave charges are pending
against the Commissioners, and when a Judi
cial investigation is made of their official
appropriation has not been sufficiently re-
duced. The street cleaning appropriation
was reduced $4,000, and every person will
agree that the reduction was proper one to
be made.
The Park Department stands in different
position from the rest There can be no sus-
picion OF dishonesty or extravaganza in its
expenditures while Colonel Henry G. Steb-
bins is at his head. But there is very gen.
eral belief that the laws which authorize--if
they do authorize--the payment of salaries of
the employees of the department out of the
proceeds of construction bonds, which 90
into the permanent debt of the city, are wrong
in principle, and should be amended. 1t is
also thought by many prudent citizens that
we can do very well with Central Park as it is
for the next ten years, and that it would be
wise economy to confne the expenditures to
TIE prQpex paiRtepanes Of the Park in its