The Roanoke daily times. (Roanoke, Va.) 1895-1897, 1896-07-31
ENGINEERS HAMPERED.
But Little Progress Made on Government
Work.


Work.
The reports Of the engineers in charge
OF the various river and harbor projects
throughout the country for the fiscal wear
ending June 30, 1896, are ,now all in. and
the most conspicuous thing about them
is the frequency with which the short SEN
tence, NO work done upon this project
during the past fiscal year occurs The
''uneNpended balances are also some
what appalling, and give one I'M idea that
good many officers of the Government
have not been earning their salaries dur
ing the last twelve months
This is not the fault of the engineers
by any means, however, and when one
of them says in his report that he has an
uneNpcnded balance of thirty or forty
thousand dollars on hand it does not mean
that he has the actual cash in his safe.
but that there is that much money pro
vided i'll the bill, but not spent Ever
since the present administration came
into power there has been more or less
trouble IN obtaining money to carry on
public improvements OF this sort and
although Congress would make specific
appropriation foI Il certain project. to be
expended within given time. the engi-
neer in charge would be unable to get the
actual cash. Undoubtedly many of them
have been notified To spend just ~ little
as possible in this way. and that ac-
counts for the present stagnation in this
Kind of work.
The policy practiced ut the Treasury
Department has seriouly hampered the
operations of the Government engineers
rs soon aS ii was discovered that the
present tariff bill. minus the income tax
feature, would not bring in uiiicient rev
puIp "a meet the 4NrpuSns nf -in C,,-nr,
ment. system of mathematics were in
augurated in the warrant division of the
Treasury. Department. which would an
parently keep down the deficit for one
month by carrying certain expenditures
over to the following month.
The Government engineers were the first
to suffer as result of this proceeding.
and they were often unable to pay the
contractors for several months because of
inability to get their drafts honored at
the Treasury. This system is not carried
out to any great extent now because eN-
penditures for Government works have
been trimmed so closely that there is
scarcely need of it. An examination of
the reports received from the engineers
in every section of the country will show
that no work upon river or harbor i'm
provements has been done during the
fiscal year ending June 30, 1896, which
could possibly go over without Getriment
to what had already been done
Some rather amusing things are found
in the reports of the Government cnci-
neers one of them having in charge a
certain section of the region around the
Great Lakes makes an exhaustive report
about the removal of Il dangerous OBJ
struction to navigation at the entrance To
harbor. He concludes by stating that
it was a boulder about a cubic yard in
size
As the water was very shallow nj the
entrance TO this harhor, it is difficult to
see how the removal of so small Il rock
should he an Undertaking worthy of so
much exploiting. Uncle sam also paws
quite bill for typewriting imam account
sent IN OF the removal of Il Sunkcn Cana
dian schooner in one of the channels
connecting the Great Lakes An elabo-
rate description i given of the work of
removing this sunken wreck. which wa,
done by contract after advertisements for
bids in all the lake city newspapers. The
entire cost of this great. undertaking was
81, 202
Under the rules of the Department the
minutcst detail of the perations o: each
engineer must be given, and very cent
expended thoroughly accounted for.
Thousands of dollars are wasted each wear
iii surveys of creeks and sloughs. which
the engineer officers have time and again
reported 10 be unworthy of improvement.
Congressman have to be reelected.
however, and river and harbor appropria-
tons are always good campaign ma
terial. Washington Times