Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1908-02-29
The Work On the Gardiner Streets.

Gardiner, Me, Feb. 2S.
Editors Kcnncbec Journal:
| am to ask the 1900 voters Of Gar
diner to support at the election next
Monday at the various polling places
in the city myself for the position of
street commissioner. Of course | am
not a new man. For several years 1
| have dug bitches, built bridges, ma lie
permanent roads, sidewalks and the
| other detailed work and extensions,
| which are not always noticed by those
that pay for them and use them. Pay
for them once in Il year and use them
every day in the year and overtime.
Hence | ask 4 few hundred words in
your columns to tell a little story Sug-
geSted by the recently circulated
handblls in favor of a respected OPP
ponent
The handbills say that in my six
years as street commissioner | have
expended some ST. 900 moro than some
Of my predecessors. don't doubt
that statement without asking the city
auditor about it and / have not the
| time to go over the old reports with
| the auditor before your paper goes to
press 1t is possible with other adj
vancemcnt larger appropriations have
been made Of late years than earlier
| do not know whether the figures Civ
On in the dodger are correct or not,
but do know that in five Of my six
years as street commissioner Henry
| harrington, city treasurer. has paid my
bills and Danforth, the city auditor
| has Q. KID them.
| Now, l wish to give your readers
and furnish for the information of the
voters, who / certainly expect will
support me on Monday, few figures
| from my books kept in the Office of j.
Gray Il Sons and scheduled for this
! letter by Howard Ring.
! In 1902 for the first time the street
commissioners salary was taken out
Of the general appropriation for high
| ways, bridges and sidewalks. which
| has amounted in my time to $4,000.
In the way Of actual. permanent i'm
provements | commenced in 1903 with
an under drain built from Winter
street to Elm street. continuing on
Water street, cost $1,000. Later in the
same year in filling land slide opposite
kingSbury street in conjunction with
the Maine Central Railroad $6SS.45 was
expended. In 1904 ! paved Depot
Square at n cost of $193325. The same
year permanent improvements on up
per Water street were made with the
building of McAdam road, costing
$4S7.19. In 1906 in rclaying the curb
! ing and brick sidewalk on Water street
| $500 was expended. In the years 1908.
'06 and '07 the push cart on Water
street cost $6S437. In 1906 Cannard
street at South Gardiner, which had
before been only lane. was laid out
as a new street at n cost of $49S.14.
| The same year at South Gardiner a
permanent road in front of Lawrence
| Bros mill was built at a cost of
sS675O In 1906 and 1907 by order of
the city government the street sprinh-
| ling cost $3.50 extra. In 1907 the grano-
| lithic sidewalks cost $1512.61. The
4 concrete sidewalks for five years under
my jurisdiction cost $6.233.1S and the
new bridge on the causeway $1775.49.
making an aggregate of $21.249.1S per-
manent improvements, which is more
than has been expended for perma-
nent improvements for the % years
previous to my holding the Office of
/ street commissioner.
! Now I have not a bit of a story to
/ tell beyond the above figures. Don't
( ask me, ask the city treasurer and
the city auditor But / would like 10
turn up the dirt, build the bridges, fix
/ the road in front of your homes for
another year. unless you do not want
me.
c. E. PICKERING