St. Tammany farmer., 1907-03-16
W ATERWORKS AND
FIRE PROTECTION.

Covington, La, March 9. 1907.
Ediror St. Tamnnany FARMER:
After every fire, for the past seven
years, / have listened to the citizens of
our town express their opinions on the
necessity of having complete and ade-
quate system Of waterworks, and
though many differ in the approximate
cost Of water system. have yet to
hear single one say that we can dc
without it.
The truth stares us in the face, and
we must either face it or play the cow
ard and turn our backs upon it. We
need, and need badly, an adequate fire
protection. Are we going to have iti
We are asking strangers to come in
and invest capital, but what do we Of.
fer them2 We are telling them that
Covington is a growing town and they
will realize handsome profits on theil
investments, and that is all very true;
but the question is, will Covington
continue to grow? Do you think stran.
gers will continue coming here and in.
vesting their savings when they reali2s
they are at the mercy of the famesT
That every small conhagratton, which
would be of no consequence In a town
where there is fire protection, menaces
the destruction of our whole town.
Covington has been extremely lucky
with her fires for the past few years.
Look back at the fire of last fall and
recall, ii you can, what saved our town
from absolute destruction-nothing
but lack of wind saved US then; and
again tho gods of the zephyrs favored
Covington in her latest confagration.
But can anyone say that Covington
will continue to be so favored? If there
is such a person In existence, let him
stand forth, and the people will hail
him as prophet. But, alas, the peo-
pie are not to be blinded by prophecies,
but have to be shown a thing before
they will believe it to be true.
Now, Mr.. Editor, for a few facts on
a waterWorks system that would be a
fire protection.
A waterworks plant could be In.
stalled that would afford fire protec-
ton at a cost of about $4,000.
A two-mil tax on the present assess
ment of the town of Covington for a
period of thirty years would amount to
about 100000 (this is placing the as
ssessment at about ST., 100000 and not
counting any increase in assessments,
which could be safely figured at 10 per
cent.)
The cost Of operation would not
amount to more than 81, 900 per year
(and I think hardly that amount, as the
two ice plants could be asked to bid on
keeping reservoir full).
Private parties could he supplied
with water and charged at the same
rate which thev are paying to private
concern.
Place number of parties subscribing
for water at 200, which is very con-
servative estimate, we would then have
an income of not less than 5000 per
month, which amount would more than
pay for the cost of operation and any
repairing that would be necessary.
In less than thirty years we would
have paid for our waterwOrks and have
same bringing a nice revenue into the
town treasury. Now is not this worth
considering?
Now, to bring this home to the great
majority of voters, we are going to see
what it would cost every man. This
can only be obtained by the co-opera-
tion of the property taxpayers, and I
am going to ask every man to look up
his tax receipt or the assessment rolls
and see what be is assessed at, and
then figure on paying SO on every thou
sand dollars for which he is assessed;
then let him look at his insurance poll
cy and see what his premium amounts
to; then let him deduct at least 90 per
cent from this amount and see, by de-
ducting what he is paying to the insur-
ance company, and adding this amount
to the taxes he has to pay, see If things
are not very nearly balanced. Then let
him think of the peace of mind he may
enjoy when he knows that because
his neighbours house is on fire his
house will not of necessity have to
burn; and again, that awful nuisance,
the dust, will haYe an element to con-
tend with that cannot be easily over
come. Let him consider well these
things, then answer the question: Scan
we afford to do without q waterworks
sYstem2" FOR PROGRESS.
We think the estimated cost of