Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1890-08-23
CAMPBELL &DICK
MORE ROOM FOR DRUNKS.
Chief Brown WIN EnInrge the Twelfth
Ward statfon-It 10 Getting to be the
Center of the Tough Population-A New

Chief Brown WIN Enlarge the Twelfth
Ward statton-Ir is Getting to be the
Center of the Tough Popularion-A New
Central Station.
Chief Brown, of the Department of Pub
lie Safety, will visit the Twelfth ward sta
tion house to-day with an architect for the
purpose of making much needed improve
ment. He has discovered that the station
is now in the center of the worst
section OF the city. and that
the business of the Police Bureau
is greater in that district than any other.
Even the Central station has been falling
behind the Twelfth ward in the past few
weeks. He accounts for this by the fact
that business houses are crowding the popu-
lation away from the city west of Grant
street. and that the foreign element is
crowding into that section of which the
Twelfth ward station is the center.
The growing population of foreigners of
all kinds, and the lower class of colored
people on the hillside above the P. r. R.,
around Twenty-eighth street, has been Civ
ing the Police Bureau a great increase of
work. and there seems to be every evidence
of a further increase. The old plan
of drinking in saloons, the Chief says,
did not result in as much drunkenness as
drinking in the house from jugs, which
is the result of the Brooks law. To prove
the truth of this statement in regard to home
drinking, the Chief points to the fact that
the 305 saloonkeepers in the city at the
present time all claim that they do more
business now than they did before the
Brooks law was put into force and when
there were over 900 saloons to supply the
demand
There are but five cells in the Twelfth
ward station now and the balance of the city
lot is covered with the patrol stable. There
is probably room for four or five more cells.
Even more than that are needed. Last
Saturday night 80 prisoners were taken
there and it is a common occurrence for 40
or 30 to be run in during one night The re-
suit is that the prisoners are so crowded
they have not even room to lie down. The
change proposed is expected to give at least |
temporary relief.
While speaking of station houses the |
Chief reforred to the need Of a new Central
station. He still favors a Monongahela
wharf site, and thinks that in another year
he will be authorized to erect a S65, 900
building there, large enough for all pur-
poses. It will provide for the several bu-
reaus of the Safety Department, now scattered
around the lower part OF the city, and for |
whose accommodation $4,000 per year is now
paid out in rent. This is very bad fnapcier- |
ing, the Chief thinks, for Sc, 900 would pay |
the interest on a loan of 500, 900 to be used |
in building new station, and the city |
would be getting something for its money.
the Chief does not think of con-
tracting such loan. he shows where the
policy of rent-paying is bad and where
new building is necessary as a money-saver.
The completion of the new Fourteenth
ward police station by the 1st of December
is expected. Bricklaying will begin on it
IN Monday. Then the old station in that
ward and the old Thirtieth ward station will
be sold. and the Chief expects to get enough
from the two properties to give the new CEN
raj station good start.