Waterbury Democrat., 1902-02-18
CARTING AWAY SNOW.
Large Force of Men and City Teams
 at Work.

Large Force of Men and City Teams
 at Work.
 The city teams and q few cars of the Connecticut Lighting and Railway company were at work to-day carting the drifts of snow eff the public streets, and while they made good headway and opened many of the fhoroughfares that were almost closed still it will be some time before all the drifts are out of the way Large forces of men are at work shove, 'n- snow and ice off the sidewalks and an effort is being made on the part of the police department to get all walks ill fair condition for public travel be- fore night. In some instances the officers are holding people down to the letter of the law, but all most of them require Is that enough of the walks be shoveled to admit pedesr.ians 10 use them without having te plough through the snow. It makes all the difference Ill the world what Kind of man happens to be doing tlutv about your premises during a sGow storm. Officers wiIo rarely ever amount to a pinch of snuff so far as ,aaintaiping law and order and who wollldf3st sca burglar operating across the st~eet are quick to catch onto a ilaudfal of snow on the sidewalk and toa't lsc,, lhe courage necessary to say So ill open meeting to the women folks. Of course the walks should 5a cleaned but the ordinance covering this pl9t- ter. as well as all others passed by the aldermen. should be cohstruod lib erally and where people shog a dis position to accommodate the orhljc that Is about all that shout, l.e re- quired. This was q peculiar storm Some people have cleaned tiieir walks half dozen times sin.a ycstertl1y morning and they were as bad as ever to-day and the work had Q Da done over again. A man is not obliged to clean his walk until the storm ceases and as the wind Is still blowing and the snow drifting about it is q ques- tion if the officers have any. eight to order walks cleared
 The ordinance relating to this mat ter reads as follows: The owner. ten ant, occupant or any person having the care of any land or buildings fronting on any street or public place in said city where there is any paved side l walk, shall, after the cessation of any storm Of snow, ice or sleet if in the daytime, within four hours, and If in the night time before o'clock in the forenoon succeeding, cause the same to be removed from such paved side walk, and, if the same cannot be wholly removed, shall sprinkle thereon sand or other proper substance. so i that such paved sidewalk shall be safe for travek and in default thereof shall ta fAAiT md x.fC each and every hour thereafter that the same shall remain on s-- -jh paved sidewalk or such paved sidewalk shall be unsafe for travel, such owner, ten ant, occupant or other person shall for felt and pay q further penalty of .S2
 The ordinance as framed provides 1 that in cases where property owners neglect to comply with it's provisions, 1 the superintendent of streets shall do the work and charge the cost up against the owners, but this part of it 1 has long since been set aside and the business of seeing that walks are cleaned confined to the police depart ment It should have been enforced as passed. for 1t is q question if it is using private citizens right to have Of ficers, some of whom know nothing about the law themselves, Iecturing them regarding sidewalk cleaning, es- pecially before the law obliges them to do the work. The job should be per formed by the city, any way. Super intendent Kelley of the street depart ment had two snow blows out yester- day and did lot of work with them that everyody appreciated. He opened paths along the streets to the factories 1 and in this way made things easy for people on the hoIneward trip. Wouldn't 1t be just as well to have the superin- l tendent make the paths on the side walks instead of in the streets? The ordinance should be amended so as to 1 put the cost of cleaning walks upon the public instead of private individu- als- All want to use them, and conse- quently everybody should contribute something towards defraying the ex- ] pense.
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