The Jersey City news. (Jersey City [N.J.]) 1889-1906, 1898-06-23
rhs Truth About the Water Account

The Truth About the Water
A very remarkable document was fled
r,stb tho Board of Trade on Tuesday
evening. and printed in the local news
na,ers Yesterday. which il its figures are
authentic, must cause the total revision
of existing ideas regarding our city water
account. The document was the report
of the Committee on Water recently APP
pointed by President Myron Furst' anor
fhe surprise which it dished up was the
discovery that the true annual deficit IN
the Water Department is just sSi'ooz-o''
and not two or three hundred thousand
dollars as had been popularity supposed
This is a discovery of great significance.
II restores public confidence; 1t vinol-
Gates the Democratic administration
which had been accused of wild extraya-
gance: it shows that by a very trirans
EFFORT Of economy the department may
be placed upon a self-sustaining nasis, II
nroves that with the establishment OF a
permanent supply, which would poash
all excuse for the Believille gang OF sine
curists. all the troubles of the, city IN Inc
subject of water finances would be at an
end.
incidentally, the report explodes a foui
and dastardly political conspiracy de-
signed to promote the interests of the Re-
publican party at the expense OF jersey
City's credit
One of the signatures to the report is
4hat of Joseph A. Dear, the Business
Manager of the Evening Journal" How
this man could rave written his endorse
ment to the facts contained In the report
without sinking to the ground for very
shame, we cannot imagine.
Every word, every figure of that report
stamps upon the Evening Journal" the
words Liar "Falsiier." Defamer,
.scredit Wrecker." Conspirator."
It was the Evening Journal which
represented that the expenses of the
Water Department were three hundred
thousand dollars a year in excess of Its
income. 1t was the Evening journal
which told the taxpayers that Democratic
management was rolling Up a water
deficit of enormou size which would soon
have to be covered in the tax budget or
added to the permanent debt of the city.
It was the Evening Journal which not
six months ago declared that the city was
a defaulter upon the interest on its water
bonds.
And now these foul inventions of po-
aitical malice are exposed and disproved
over the signature of Joseph A. Dear, the
Journals own Publisher.
The purpose of the fabrications is plain.
1t is all designed for campaign purposes.
It was conceived in the same spirit as
the Raines Law Hotel connections which
murdered Charles H. Winfield and heaped
mountains of shame on their perpetrators
in the early part of this year.
WHILE the figures of the Board of
Trade Committee show the Water Ac-
count to be essentially solvent. it fails to
speak of the practical abuse in the system
which so often makes the city 'slow pay
This is the failure of many consumers to
nay their rates promptly and the supine-
ness Of the city in enforcing collection.
Thus IT happens that at the present mo-
ment the city owes a considerable sum to
persons having claims against the Water
Department, and at the same time it is
the creditor of large and small water
consumers for even a larger aggregate
amount.
The trouble is the same as thai which
stThe News pointed out when Mr. Allan
y. McDermott started an agitation over
the general finances of the city, some
YEAR or so ago. The besetting evil for
years untold has been laxity Of collection
and there must always be slow payments,
growing claimants, suspicious citizens,
alarmed officials. and malicious political
misrepresenters, so long as the income OF
the city is not collected up to the last
possible cent in all branches.
There should be 10 liberation for a de-
linquent whose claim is u~ndisputed.
where there are unsettled questions, of
course. time must be given for the courts
TO decide: but the vast mass Of the money
due the Water Account is plain, simple
matter of arrears, and can be collected
the moment pressure is applied.
The pressure should be applied promptly
and uncompromisingly.
Another Remarkable Water Doeu-
~ouf.