St. Paul daily globe. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn.) 1884-1896, 1891-10-25
CITY HALL GOSSIP.

oust WHY the ScOre Oh Seullemcn VINO con-
! stitute the common council can not settle
| the garbage question is a conundrum. When
| ever the matter comes up, either in commit
! tee meetings or in regular sessions of the
| council, a vast amount of valuable time is
| consumed i'll discussing the various phases of
| the gruesome affair. Yet at the end of the
| debates the city fathers are just as far off
| from any solution as when they started il.
| The board of aldermen last Tuesday evenings
| spent considerable time in the discussion O f.
| the bills presented monthly by the Azetines
] company. with the result that though the
accounts were disallowed, further delay wa
made in settling the question of collecting
| the garbage. A special joint committee will
now wrestle with the matter, but just why
this action should be taken is not very clear. 3
II the council would only handle the tire
| some affair as il should be handled, it would
| take but very few minutes to arrive at a con-
clusion which would satisfactorily solve the
| problem.
| The city attorney has filed with the council
! long and mastery opinion of the situation
| as regards the collection of garbage and its
| destruction by Henry Fleishman, represented
| by the Azotine company. The compaIiyt
| should be compelled to carry out Its CONTRACT
| to dispose of the garbage at its plant in the
| Fifth ward, and failure to do so should re-
suit in the contract being declared void by
| the council. The statements made by the
AZotine company that the building inspec-
| tor Will not grant a permit to rebuild its
| works are perfectly absurd. The building
inspector has no right to refuse a permit to
| any one, SO long as the laws governing the
| Office are complied with. Mandamus pro-
| ceedings would secure for the Azotine com
pany the necessary permits in very short
order if it felt disposed to take such a STEP
The fact of the matter is that the company
does not desire to rebuild on the upper
levee, for the reason that it fears the COM
plants made by the Fifth ward citizens last
winter will be repeated, and that is the rea-
son it asks the council 10 allow 1t to destroy
the garbage at South st. Paul, where it
possesses some kind of plant.
o
In the matter of contracts between the
| city and contractors for the carrying out of
any link of work. the interests of the city
demand that such contracts be faithfully ex-
| ecuted in every detail The council by re-
| fusing to allow the bills persistently pre-
| sented by the Azotine company recognizes
the fact that the contracts are not being car
ried out, and therefore should not hesitate
to take such steps as will bring the company
| to time. or cancel the agreements.
The question of insurlng the school build
| ings of the city is not viewed in the same
| light by the assemb ly and the board OF alder
| men. The upper ouse some weeks ago de-
cided that the city was paying out thousands
| of dollars yearly for insnring the school
| buildings when there was no necessity for
| the expenditure. Fires in school houses
| are so infrequent that any ordinary minded
| person can. with very little reasoning, see
that the city would save money
| by carrying its own fire insurance;
| that is, instead of paying out
| large sums yearly to insurance companies, to
| place the money in a special fund which
would draw interest, and in the event of
damage to school building by fire the loss
could be paid out OF such fund The assem-
| blymen were unanimous in deciding that the
! policies of insurance should be Cancelled. vet
last Tuesday evening when the matter came
I'D before the board of aldermen, the lower
| house was equally unanimous that the in
! surance policies should remain. Now why
should there be such wide divergence of
| opinion between the two bodies? The assem-
| bly, Will. however, triumph in the end, for the
| reason that the insurance policies were taken
| out by the old board of education. AS the
| new charter prohibits the creation of anv in
| debtedness whatever by the present board,
| without the consent of the council. the iu-
| surance companies will renew the policies at
their own risks, for when the accounts are
presented to the council the odds are 100 to
that the assembly will knock them sky high.
| 1t is significant fact that from the time
the Bell charter went into force, up to the
present day, large number of claims have
! been filed against the city for damages sus-
| tanned by reason of detective sidewalks
| Under the old charter the board of public
! works had the right to authorize the city en-
| gineer to repair defective sidewalks, and if
/ past repair TO put new ones in, and assess
| the cost upon the property owners. Under
| the present law, however. new sidewalks can
! only be put down upon petition of the ma
| Jority of the property owners benefited Ac-
cording to the city engineer. fifty miles of
wooden sdewalk..yearly require replacing, and
| cannot be repaired. being rotten and useless
| Now, unless the property owners come to
the front and ask for new sidewalks which
| they will pay for, the old ones must remain
in dangerous condition, subjecting passers-
| by to injuries, and rendering the city liable
| to suits for damages. All that the board of
| public works can do at the present time is to
| order the property owners to have the de-
tectiye sidewalks repaired failing which, the
city engineer fences them III, most unsat-
| isfactory state of affairs for everyone.
|
The Ramsey county delegation of the last
| legislature was wise body of men, and anx.
ious to make a record for ecouomizing, lop-
| ped off useless expenditures in every depart
| ment of the city government. The offices of
| fire wardens were abolished. and the nice old
| gentlemen who acted, or rather did rot act.
as fire wardens, found that, like Otheilo.
| their occupation was gone. Can the Ramsey
| county delegation or any one else explain
I why i'll the pursuance OF their policy of re-
| trenchment and reform, the office of gas
| lamp inspector was created? The present
| incumbent draws the salary of 500 per
month. and his duties consist in reporting TO
the board Of public works monthly the num-
berand location of all gas and gasoline lamps
which during the previous month have been
| unllehted, broken or destroyed Considering
that the members of the police department
have for years, and do at the present time.
report all lamps unlighied, it would seem
that the lamp inspector is but fifth wheel.
1t is absurd TO think that one man could in
| spect every lamp in the city nightly, yet the
| police department collectively do this work.
The creation of the Office was simply an in
stance of the inconsistency displayed by the
| delegation which represented Ramsey county.