Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1908-12-07

/ titled "a bill to change the name and
| jurisdiction of the inferior courts OF tne
| Columbia Under the organization as
contemplated by this bill, all the justices
of the peace will be assembled In one
building in central location. and ny
| means of machinery therein provided II
will result in better service to TIL. vari-
| Gus suitors before the court and to a
more systematic and expeditions han
ding of the various moneys received. Inc
| Commissioners desire to impress upon
| Congress the Importance of enacting the
] foregoing bill
| Legislation will also be recommended to
! Congress under which collaterals de-
i posted by individuals to secure their at
t tendance befor, the Police Court which
remain on deposit for three years or more
| with that official. will be covered into
! the Treasury to the credit of the District
Of Columbia. Und-r existing law there
is no way of disposing of moneys of this
| kind, with the consequent result that the
| fund is being increased from year to
year and in the absence of legislation
! for the disposition Their OF after a certain
period ii would continue to remain in
| bank to the credit OF the clerk of the
| Police Court.
To Expedite Condemnation.
| In the last session Of Congress a bill
was introduced to amend section 491n OF
/ the Code of Law for the District OF Co
| lumba IS. 4S14). under the provisions
F., of which the District would be author
| ICED to pay into the registry Of the court
| moneys awarded for land condemned for
public use. which cannot be paid on ac-
count OF the owners refusing to acc pit
| the awards. or failure to locate parties
entitled thereto. Or by reason of defect
| in the title. Present provisions OF the
| code. authorizing the payment of money
| into the registry Of the court. have been
held not to apply to cases of tl1is kind
The Commissioners will endeavcr to have
this bill enacted in order to dispose Of
about seventy-five cases now pending.
for which payments cannot be made,
with the consequent inability of the Dis
trict to enter upon the property and
make the improvements authorized by
law.
The work of the street cleaning depart
ment has been prosec' ted as efficiently
as possible. although r,uch better results
could undoubtedly b, obtained if the ap
preparation for sweeping and sprinkling
the streets was increased Some idea OF
the growth of the work of the depart
ment is shown by the fact that the in
spectors on machine-swept streets super
visad the cleaning of 5O36S.551 square
yards more of street area in 1905 than
i'm 1907: the inspectors on unimproved
street cleaning supervised the cl aiming OF
a,O31 1854 square yards more Of street area
IN 1908 than in 1907: the alley inspect
ors supervised the cleaning of 3.9OS. S66
square yards more of alley area in 1908
than in 1907: the garbage collections
amounted to 300 tons more in 1908 than
in 1907: there were 6526S bags of paper
collected in 1908 in excess of the collec-
tons of 1907. and $3.50 more dead ami
mails were collected during the fiscal year
1903 than during the fiscal year 1907. All
this additional work AnCnmnlI shed
without an increased force and with an
appropriation of only $4,000 in excess of
the previous year. The total area cleaned
by hand amounted to 49O,O0O.OO0 square
yards.
Street Cleaning by Hand.
The Commissioners renew their recon-
mendation to Congress that the present
cost limitation on hand cleaning of 10
cents per thousand square yards be IN
creased to not less than u cents per
thousand square yards. because an in
creased limitation would enable the
department to decrease the present
surface area assigned to each man from
10000 square yards to about 500 square
yards, which is the maximum area which
ought to be assigned to each laborer. The
public dumps are b,ing rapidly filed up.
necessitating longer and more expen-
sive haul. thus increasing the cost of dis
posing Of the sweepings. In addition to
this. the amount of waste paper on the
streets, sidewalks and parking spaces
| is so great that two hours OF the la
horers time Is devoted to its collection,
eaving them but six hours for the ac-
tual work of sweeping the streets.
A slightly increased appropriation en-
abled the Commissioners to increase the
area of paved streets cleaned by ma
chimes from 37;.OOOOOO square yards in
1907 to 423.0ooo0o square yards in 1908.
The ideal condition would be to keep all
streets in clean condition by hand dur
ing the day white the machines went over
them at night, but the expense necessary
to meet this work is so large that the
Commissioners do not feel justified in SUBJ
uniting to Congress an estimate for this
work. They have. however. asked for a
larger sum in order that streets which are
now swept three times week may be
swept nightly and that the constant addi-
tions of newly paved streets to the city's
street area may be given constant and
thorough attention.
The Commissioners also favor the more
frequent cleaning of alleys and will ask
Congress to appropriate sum sufficient
to clean all the alleys in the city at least
twice week. The ley area cleaned last
year AMOUNTED to 4S.OOOOOO square Yards
The problem Of sprinkling the streets has
been one to which the Commissioners have
given considerable attention. The demand
for sprinkling comes from every section
who reside on streets where street cars
operate. The proposition already SUBJ
mitted to Congress by the Commissioners
that the street railroad companies should
! be compelled to sprinkle their tracks and
thus reduce to minimum the annoyance
of clouds of dust raised by fast moving
cars is again Endorsed and the enactment
OF the law strongly recommended. The
various divisions of work In the jurisdic-
ton of the street cleaning department.
r,T
garbage. ashes, miscellaneous refuse and
energy and with admirable results The
inspectors have done their duty faithfully
and fines have been imposed upon the
contractors wherever failure to execute
the terms of the contract has been shown
to be the fault of the contractor.
Treatment Of Lunacy Cases.
The number of lunacy cases during the
year showed a gratifying decrease. In
1905 the number of petitions filed aggre-
gated 356: in 1907 there were 321. and in
1908 there was further reduction to 3lo
In this connection the Commissioners re-
new their previous recommendation for
the establishment Of a psychopathic hos
pital in the District OF Columbia The
necessity for an institution of this char
acter is becoming more and more appar-
ent. Every day the hospitals of this city
are called upon to receive for treatment
cases which may or may not be i'm the in
80 f<,