Waterbury evening Democrat. [volume] (Waterbury [Connecticut]) 1903-1917, 1908-03-05
CITY WORK BY DAY
will Give Employment 10 the
Home LabOrerS.

The action taken by the board OF
aldermen in ordering the department
of public works to proceed as soon
as possible to open up city work for
| the benefit of the unemployed OF the
town, shows that the people are be-
ginning to open their eyes to the Vi
ciousness of system which puts local
| laborers at a disadvantage with
Workmen who come in from other
places. The contract system which
was SO long in vogue here was a
severe blow to Waterbury laborers,
but the thing escaped public notice
until now, when SO many are idle
that something had to be done. The
| first thing thought of was city work,
but somebody said 1t had to be done
| by contract. In most cases this is
| true, but good deal can be done by
| day, and if business does not improve
| in the factories everybody will see
before the end of the summer what a
serious blunder it was to have passed
legislative enactment which obliges
the city to do certain kinds of work
by contract. 1t would be a great
benefit to Waterbury If the city could
go ahead and construct sewers and
put down permanent pavement, but
this is out of the question unless you
want to let the work go without
assessing anything for benefits, and
here again you are up against the
charter, which states that sewers
shall cost $3.50 per lineal foot. With
the consent of the mayor the board
of public works is within it's lines in
laying water mains and grading
streets, but it is pity that it can
not take hold of bigger projects. Look
at the amount of money the city is
putting into the sewage disposal
plant, and yet a Waterbury man
can't get chance to earn a dollar
down there. The contractors and
the bosses all belong out of town and
| bring their own men and teams here
and as consequence local man
| is not in it. This hurts everybody,
| the business man as well as the la
| borer, but because the public was
misled by the notion that it paid
to do things that way nobody cared
to speak against a system that was
eating the life out of the community.
1t took the hard times to force the
hand of the powers that be and while
they are at it they wouldn't stop
until they instruct the city attorney
to appear before the next session of
the general assembly and have the
contract law changed so that with
| the approval of the board of alder
men and the mayor the board of pub
lie works will have power to perform
any kind of public work that comes
along.
The city of Worcester does prac-
tically all its own work and finds
| that it pays. The same thing is
true of other towns. What's the rea-
son Waterbury cannot follow in the
| footsteps of such places and furnish
employment to as many of it's own
citizens as are able to work out of
doors? The city can save money for
the taxpayers by constructing sew
ers, putting down pavements and
performing such other work as the
boards find and decide that public
necessity and convenience require
and order done, with the possible ex-
ception of a project like the build
ing of new reservoir.
, Why don't they do 1t then? This
is a question that has often been
asked, but nobody has ever dared to
answer 1t, but perhaps one would not
be far from the fact II he should say
that things are in their present shape
because 1t is easier for heads of de-
partments to let things by contract
| than do them by the day.