The San Francisco call., 1898-01-20
DELIVER THE CITY TO HER
 OPPRESSORS A Scheme to Renew the w ater Com pany's Lease. Exposed by The Gall in the Interest of the
 Poor. Labor Unions of the South In- dorse the Action of This
 Paper.
GRATEFUL FOR A CHANGE.
Local Newspaper Ring, Owned by the Corporation, Has Sought to
 Silence Hostile Criticism.
Special Dispatch to The Call.

LOS ANGELES, Jan. 19.-The peo- pie of Los Angeles 4 4 4 4 4 A 4 have never before LOS ANGELES, 4 baar os +bo,o,,ot \ Jan. 19.-Stephen 4 ly aroused upon 4 +arv of inc Toe 4 any public matter 4 Angeles City 4 as they are now Y Water Company 4 upon the attitude was Iequesteu q py VI SC'eh OA ehS 4 tive to give to 4 nine members of < the paper a state the City Council 4 ment in detail of 4 and the syndicated companys local press with oo-,tro,ers1, 1..e "'-'e' regard to the ac- Mr Mott suh 4 Quirement by the 4 r4itted the mat -A munfcipality of it's 4 ter to the Board 4 water plant now Directors or held under lease 7Tba1, dactdad + by the corpora < make no state < tion. Not until The 4 ment. The prof 4 Call sounded the 4 fer was made to 4 note of o1orro did < m in good 4
 N ~ III ~ 4 faith in order 4 Ihe peop4e TedIlze that any state 4 that their rights 4 ment the com 4 were being trifled 4 pany desired to 4 with and that Q make could be 4 well defined plan plesIH'eu .o tlie was being gradu- The Cal as well x ally carried to a < as the peoples < successful termin- 4 side of the 4 a i o n whereby CT y. they were either to atT,o,,+ oa1,ao. nl-,.al. have burden of now be made almost two mill % ~ -~ < ~ -s- lion dollars saddled upon them, for which they would receive no value, or the franchise and lease of the present company was to be extended for a pe- riod of fifty years.
 The reason the people have not been awakened to the situation lies in the fact that the three local dailies-the Times, Herald and EXpress-were ab- solutely controlled by the water com- pany.
 All avenues by which the people could be reached were cut off until The Call took up their fight and gave the first complete and authentic state ment of the exact situation that had been published.
 The result has been that for two days the details given have furnished the sole topic of discussion and now for the first time is given the most start ling intelligence that has yet been un- folded in this connection.
 It has never been definitely under stood just why the water company was so desirous of delaying any and all action that in any way tended to affect municipal control and operation of the distributing system. This has always been the policy of the corporation and of its three daily organs. Through seven members of the City Council the water company has been successful in so blocking the progress of what. under the contract, is simple business plan, | that not one essential step to that end | has yet been taken.
 The object of the delay is to carry out a scheme by which this generation and the next one to come will be held | in the tentacles of the corporation When the water company is forced to do so it will give to the Council figure for which it will sell it's plant That figure will be between g, 500 900 and S, COG, ,000.
 The idea is then to have it's hench- men in the Council call a bond election to vote the required amount of bonds topurchase at the exorbitant figure. If by any chance the bonds should carry, the company would then be receiving | over million and a half above what the plant is worth. But it is well known that any bond proposition giving the water company more than a fair value
 
 for it's plant would be defeated. This is what the corporation desires. It would herald abroad the announcement that the voters of the city of Los An geles had declined to vote bonds to purchase municipal water plant, and would say the result of the election clearly demonstrated that the people did not want municipal ownership.
 Then would come the deliberate be- trayal of a public trust The scheme is to have the present City Council give to the corporation a new lease and franchise to cover period of fifty years, for which the company will give to the city $1.0OO,000 in cash. Up to the present time the water company has seven votes In the Council. These nem- bers have always voted as the corpo-