The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1902-02-01

into fertilizer by municipal concern
which yields a net income.
The very parks are made to net an
| income. BY careful management the
| timber is so handled by a municipal
! forestry committee. that school
grounds, municipal pleasure grounds
hospital grounds yield a net sum after
keeping the walks and lawns
and paying all its own sal
aries, equal to fifty per cent of the
! gross revenues from sales. This is
turned into the municipal treasury as
profits. We shall find that the German
city holds itself responsible for the ed
ucation of all, for the provision of
amusement and the means of recrea-
ton; for the adaptation of the training
of the young to the necessities of gain
ing a livelihood technical training in
the public school; for the health of
families; for the moral interests of all;
for the civilizing Of the people; for the
promotion of individual thrift: for the
development of advantages and oppor-
tunities to promote the industrial and
commercial well-being, and incidental
ly for the supply of common services.
and the introduction of conveniences.
We shall find that the dominant mo-
tive in the development of the munic-
ipal functions of Glasgow and other OF
the British cities to be the public
health. And that recurring epidemics
throughout all continental cities have
actually been blessings in disguise. For
the pangS Of mortal fear backed by the
demands of an insistent progressing
science will go farther to loosen purse
strings than a chronic state of bad san
itary conditions and greater loss of
life from insidious causes. Bubonic
plague and cholera are sensational dis
eases. They tie up business. The i'm
provements set on foot by the cholera
of 1885 resulted in the saving of many
thousands of lives a year. For the
principal result of efforts to guard
against cholera and plague is TO abol-
ish or greatly diminish mortality from
other causes.
Honolulu approaches the municipal
problem in a state, as it were, of pro-
toplasm. city rich in philanthropic
she stands in that noblest Of
all charities, the public good, bankrupt.
This condition of paucity in public funds,
poverty stricken and tumble down
wharves and streets, scrubby. malarious
squares for parks, foul smelling alleys |
and rear areas cannot be remedied by |!
handsome and magnificent private gift, |
but demands organized, far reaching
plans, and the working equipment of an |
organic body which includes a public !
revenue. For it costs money to keep a !!
city clean, and make good streets. It |
costs money of course to put down vol !
canic rock, which ventures no promise I
of permanence other than pulp in six |
months. But such street work is not |
legitimate expense, but riotous waste OF /
The peoples money. The student of mu- |
nicipal government will learn how other |
people do these things. A German city
1ecldes, let us say, to have well paved |
streets and to moderniZe its whole Sys- |
-em of thoroughfares. 1t proceeds to .
earn all that can possibly be known |
about street making. The effect upon !
Inherent materials of climatic conditions |
S studied theoretically and experimental
V The municipal department of public |
works does not move a step until every
ietail of the problem, from the engineer
ng and financiering standpoint, has been
worked out. In this fashion the mag
lihcent public works of Berlin have pro-
,eeded, with the result that from 1870
o 1917, IL may be asserted that one hum
lred thousand dollars accomplished more
or the permanent making of good streets
Berlin than one million dollars did in |
New York. Vastly more money had been
pent In New York during those twenty
ears yet all but few favored streets
we're as impossible as Constantinople |
While Berlin was beautifully paved. End
ess triumph for German organization
nd business methods
OF what use is all this? Simply this:
titles, like individuals, grow in two ways
the subjective growth, the objective
rowth. The subjective growth, the un-
gliding leaf by leaf of the life, the charm
nd the individuality of a city, partly an
dJustment of the expanding life within
o conditions of climate and country will
insure to Honolulu forever her inherent
harm. The objective growth. the re-
ponse to impulse, stimulus from with
ut, may be the response to the stimulus
f results in the great cities OF the world
which finds expression in an organized
fort to build here at the cross roads
I the Pacific a great commercial me-
ropolis which, situated where the East
IN and Western civilizations meet under
oRditions foreign to each, may draw
pom the art of the Orient and the sci
ntific achievement of West in it's beau
lful upbuilding. The first step is exist
commercially is threaten
q by dilly-dallying with conditions
Thich threaten life and whole health of
he public. The time is past for Homo
llu to sit, stepped in Liliputian COM
ats. Let municipal clubs, instead of po-
teal parties, adjust and discuss the
eeds of the charter. We can't hops to
0 as well at first as the mother country.
ut we study, think work and act
ANNA ALWARD EAMES.