Los Angeles herald., 1892-10-12
A FEW OF THEIR CONTRACTS,
The Supervisors Eagerness for
an Examination.
Some Little Business Matters Which
Interest Taxpayers.
Some Matters Which the Board Should
Ask the Grand Jury to 1nves-
tigate-Those Fancy
Chandeliers.

The board of supervisors yesterday
passed no resolutions requesting the
district attorney to present to the grand
jury for investigation any more Of their
official acts. The board has probably
arrived at the conclusion that this bust.
ness of requesting the district attorney
by resolution, and with great flourish
of trumpets, to have the grand jury in
vestigate them as to some particular act
Of theirs is liable to result disastrously.
IT WAS INDEED FUNNY.
When the citizens of Los Angeles read
yesterday morning that the board had,
by resolution, requested the district
attorney to have the grand jury inyesti,
gate the clock transaction, broad
smile suffused the faces of great many
readers who knew anything at all Of the
facts in the case. The idea that they
formed was that the resolution was a
great big bluff, promulgated for the pur-
pose of deceiving few persons who per-
haps might not be fully up with the
facts of the case as printed in the news
papers.
Now, if the board of supervisors are
really anxious to have some of their
acts investigated, they can today pass a
resolution requesting that the district
attorney have the grand jury look into
some of the present repairing work that
is being done on the first floor of the
court house, and the causes which have
led up to it.
WORTHLESS JOB.
To begin with, it can be stated upon
the authority OF the chairman OF the
board of supervisors himself-S. M.
Perry-that the steam fitting work
which was put into the court house orig
inally was a terribly botched job. In
fact, it was go bad that it was practically
useless.
This was done under sub-contract
from the main contractor for the build
ing, Brady. 1t cost about $40. 900. The
work was accepted by the board and
| paid for with the good, hard d-earned
money of the taxpayers of this county.
Now, at this late day, the board has
discovered that the steam fitting work
has been put in in an unworkmanlike
manner, and the result is that greater
portion of the work is now being done
over again at the expense of the people.
In other words, the work that was done
by Mr.. Brady and paid for once out of
the treasury, is now being done again at
the expense of the people.
WHY THINGS ARE TORN UP.
This explains the torn up condition of
the hallway on the first floor. The con-
duit is being put in and the new steam
fitting is being done at the expense OF
the county under the supervision of A.
J. Norton, the engineer of the building.
No contract has been let out. The job
is being done by the days work. The
brick conduit alone costs over $4,000.
Engineer Norton is of the opinion that
it was unnecessary to tear out all OF the
steam fitting that was put in under Mr..
Brady's contract, and which has been
already paid for. To do this would re-
quire the tearing up of the whole first
floor of the court house, and the expense
would be something tremendous, not to
speak of weeks of inconvenience and ab-
solute cessation of business on the lower
floor of the magnificent stone pile on
the hill.
HAVE TO PAY AGAIN.
Therefore Mr.. Norton, who is highly
recommended as an engineer and me-
chanic, has devised a scheme to repair
the imperfections of the first steam
fitting work which will probably be
productive of good results, at least he
thinks it will. To carry out his scheme.
though, the county has been forced to
employ small army of laborers to con-
struct conduits, the length of which
goes into the hundreds of feet, excavate
trenches, tear up floors, etc. All of this
the people pay for, and, mind you. it is
work that they have already paid for
once.
Perhaps the board of supervisors may
not pass resolution requesting the
grand jury to look into this job, but it
would be just as well if they did so any
way. Nobody charges that there has
been anything crooked or any money
stolen as for as the doing of this steam
fitting work twice is concerned. But as
general thing people do not like to pay
twice to have their work done right
once. 1t goes against the grain.
LOOK INTO OTHER MATTERS.
And while the grand jury Is at work
investigating some Of the supervisors
contracts, let them look into the con-
tract awarded on the 9TH day of August,
1891. to furnish the gas fxtures-the
fancy chandeliers, as it were--for the
two lower stories of the court house, for
$6560.78. They can also investigate the
contract let on the 4th day of January,
1892, for chandeliers for the upper story,
Tor $2586. This makes grand total of
$9l46.78 paid for gas fixtures and chan
deliers for the third story of the court
house.
1t the investigation is going to be COM
menced at all, let it be 30 arranged that
it will extend all along the line.
Nrro Fcr Dn