Los Angeles herald., 1891-01-11
TEE REIGN cF ExTRAvAGAaCE.

Yesterday we showed that the great
state of Oregon-great in every sense,
in scenic attractions and staplelproduc-
tions-only collected $491 900 into the
state treasury. We also showed that
the single county OF Los Angeles sent
four-ifths of that sum to Sacramento as
her proportion of the state taxes of Cal
Norma, and it was the dismembered
county of Los Angeles at that, with Or
ange county Topped Off. Why is this
thus? Taxpayers of city and county,
ask yourselves thisquestion Why should
you be dropping all these nickels into
the slot at Sacramento, never again to
be seen in Southern California? And
echo answers why, and the echo and re-
echo reverberate in the brain and con-
science of every well-wisher OF his kind
in the state. 1
Does not every. .Angelefo know that he
has been "cinched" to the point of des-
peration by the tax-eater? Why should
it cost so much to govern the city Of
Los Angeles? Why should it cost SO
much to govern the county of Los An
geles? The answer is plain. Two or
three people are employed to do what
one could readily do. Two or three
prices are in many cases paid for labor
and material. Every detail OF the city
government is expensive. Parasites
quite as disastrous as the red, white and
black scale and the vine pest cucumber
every detail of the city government and
every incident of our county expendi-
lures.
Our city school system is unprece-
dentedly expensive. Our teachers, with
light work, get the salaries that were
fashionable in the days when every
artery of California was running gold
either into the pan OF the placer miner,
the crucible or the stamps OF the miner
OF quartz.
In this respect we have a fancy and
fanciful system. We give the maximum
of pay for the minimum of work and
inconvenience. These remarks apply to
the city. f
Why should our roads cost us such
prodigious sums, with absolutely moth
ing to show for the outlay? Out at
Redlands, in San Bernardino county,
the Smiley Brothers, of New York
private individuals-are making more
roads than our people make in year,
entirely at their own expense. The
people of Riverside, in the creation OF
Magnolia avenue, have done more in
road-making aud in the creation of
beautiful vistas, than. has the rich and
populous county of Los Angeles during
the past twenty years.
If we cannot have the beauty and
the enterprise of our neighbors, we
ought at least to be able to save these
profigate outlays. Such misadventure
has attended every incident of expend-
iture in Los Angeles city and county, of
late years, that we would seem to be
laboring under some malign genius.
But why not get down to the solid
work of economy? Our taxes are not
only excessive, but shameiully so. Why,
for instance, should we not make public
employees work, instead of furnishing
every charter official with a number of
elegant incompetents to stumble over?
The biggest kind of boom would
start in Los Angeles if we should re-
duce our taxes one half. There is 10
obstacle in the way except the habit we
have adopted OF hiring three men to do
one mans work, and the patience with
which we have become accustomed to
see large road funds drained without
any corresponding roads. And so ad
imfnitam.