The New York herald. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1840-1920, 1876-01-06
The maror ana tas slnklng Fund.

INC mayor anu tNe SAhAAS
Mayor Wickhams recent Message to the
Common Council is remarkable for the igno-
rance it displays Of the laws relating to the
municipal government. The sinking fund
and all that pertains 10 it is the most impor-
tant public trust under the government and
every detail of its composition and condition
should be as familiar to the Mayor of the
city as the letters of the alphabet Yet MIR.
Wickham, while assuming to advise as to
the future policy to be pursued in relation
to the sinking fund, evidently talks of a sub
ject he does not understand He enormously
supposes that the interest received on the
stocks and bonds purchased with the money
belonging to the sinking fund is used, first,
to pay the interest on that portion of the
public debt for the principal and interest of
which the fund is pledged, and then that
the excess of the interest thus received on
the sinking fund securities is transferred to
the general fund by authority of the
law of 1862, and goes to reduce
the next years taxation We quote
from the text of the Message
sinking fund itself, says the Mayor,
sis now largely in excess of the amount
of the securities for which it is pledged,
and the amount of interest earned by the
investments of the fund is annually more
than one million dollars in excess of the
interest payable by it. That annual excess
of the interest account is, at the end of each
year, transferred to the general fund (by
authority of an act of 1862 and then used to
reduce taxes"
No clerk who has been six months in the
Comptroler's Office could make such a sue
cession of blunders. The amount of interest
earned by the investments Of the fund" is
not used to pay any portion of the interest
due on the city debt, and not dollar of that
amount passes into the general fund. The
interest earned by the investments of
the fund, ON the contrary, goes into the sink
ing fund itself, and now forms the greater
portion of the increase of that fund. The
ordinance creating the fund and directing
the investment OF its moneys provides that
all interest accruing on such investments
"shall regularly be carried to the sinking
fund for the redemption of the city debt
The interest on certain portion of the pub
lie debts paid from quite different source
namely, from the sinking fund for the pay
ment of interest on the city debt. The blum
ders made by the Mayor are attributable to
his ignorance of the fact that there are two
distinct sinking funds-the one for the re-
demption of the city debt and the other for
payment of interest on the city debt. The
law of 1862, chapter 1853, instead of trans
ferring any portion of the interest received
on the securities of the sinking fund to
the general fund, as the Mayor in
correctly supposes, provides that the
surplus revenues of the sinking fund
for the payment of interest on the city debt,
after the interest for which they are pledged
has been paid, shall be transferred to the
general fund for the reduction of the annual
taxation. Prior to the passage of that act
this surplus went into the sinking fund for
the redemption of the city debt, where the
interest on the sinking fund securities still
continues to go. As the Mayor undertakes
to advise as to the future management of the
sinking fund, it will be well for him first to
learn what the sinking fund is and what the
laws in relation to it provide. To that end
he had better take lesson from the Comp
troller instead of constantly carping at and
quarrelling with that officer