Evening star., 1902-01-17
THE DISSENTING OPINION
COMMISSIONER ROSS INDORsEs
MARKET COMPANY's APPLICATION.
Believes the Establishment Would
Have Been of Public Benefit
Statement of Views.

As was announced in The Star last even
ing, Commissioner John W. Ross dissented
from the decision of the majority of the
District board in declining to grant the ap-
plication of the Columbia Market Company
for permit to build market house on the
east side of 14th street between V and w
streets northwest. During all the consider
alton of the project Mr.. Ross is understood
to have been in favor of granting the per-
nit, while Commissioner Macfarland presi-
dent of the board. was opposed to the mar
ket scheme. Engineer Commissioner Bid
die cast the deciding ballot against the
market.
In dissenting from the views of the ma
jority as outlined in The Star yesterday,
Mr.. Ross has made the following indorse-
ment on the papers:
"A very attractive plan of building was
presented, which would have covered a
present vacant lot, surrounded by rather
unattractive looking biflboards; the project
had the approval of a large number of
property owners in the immediate vicinity.
Fourteenth street is, in fact, a business
street; the promoters promised to keep all
market wagons off 14th street, and it was in
the power of the Commissioners to have
enforced an order to that effect. not
to interfere with travel on that important
thoroughfare. ..--
Quoted tend to the-public advantage. They
concentrate in one locality nearly every
thing one wants to buy in the way of food
and furnish it fresh from the producer.
They are subject, in exceptional de-
gree, to the inspection of the officials of
the health department, so as to prevent the
sale of unwholesome and improper foods.
Some of the Advantages.
There is an immense territory between
the boundary and the District line which
will soon be built up, and which would
naturally have recourse to a market so
situated. To the people of small means in
all of that vicinity it would afford food sup
plies without the cost of car fare. There
must be in the general vicinity a market in
time, and l believe that the building up Of
this market would tend to the Improvement
of the neighborhood.
Il was especially desirous that, as pro-
posed by the plan of the promoters, 1t
should become a model market, character
lied by cleanliness, good order and good
mana cement, patterned after the markets
which 1 have heard are established in Paris
and other European cities, which do not
constitute nuisance to any one"
Il am informed that the withdrawal of
the application for a permit for the erec-
ton of the store building at the corner of
18th and V streets was due wholly to the
long and protracted delay in acting upon
the application for a permit for the mar
ket itself inasmuch as six months had
elapsed since the issuance of the permit,
and 1t would therefore of necessity have
to be renewed, and that it was not thereby
intended to indicate that the building would
not be erected if the market were allowed
Regarding the Regulations.
'1t seems to me that the building regu-
lations should be amended in some way,
so as not to invite promoters to go to the
expense and trouble Of procuring all of
the signatures required by the regulation,
with no possibility, or no likelihood, that
the Commissioners would after that had
been done issue permit; that 1t would
be well to have the regulations so framed
as that the locality of the market can be
presented to the Commissioners for their
consideration, and, if wholly Objectionable
to the Commissioners, even with the con-
sent of those property owners Immediately
concerned, that the promoters be so ad-
Il in advance.
VS. q case the promoters had the con-
In TN: ~aiority of the property own
sent or the n--- on which the market
ars IN square 80, of the majority of
was TO De located anu -nediately west
the owners in the square in,.- -
Of the said square on 18th stree..