The morning journal-courier., 1908-08-18
FIRE DEPARTMENT ESTIMATES.

FIRE DEPARTMENT ESTIMATES.
 The commissioners estimates for the coming year are worthy of being accorded uncommon approval. At first glance 1t might seem that the $S54,560 asked for Is large, as compared with the appropriation of Sl99,525 allowed last year, yet 1t cannot be said that any of the objects for which money is asked is needless or extravagant. In practically every case money has been asked for as the direct result of rec concentrations made by the experienced representatives of the National Board of Fire Underwriters, fact which should be of no little weight with the board of finance when 1t comes to con slider the estimates.
 This paper has many times comment ed favorably upon the plans for cen- tral fire headquarters building which should be fire proof and up to date, and where the recording instruments of new alarm system, which Is also ask ed for, would be safely housed For the headquarters the commissioners have asked sS0,000 and for the new alarm system s2O,OoO both of which seem to be conservative amounts
 The third object for which money Is asked Is no less worthy than the oth- CTS. It provides for a raise in the standard of wages For the good of the service in the department this ob- ject Is quite as important as any If New Haven's fire department has done good work in the past, and there can be none to deny that 1t has, 1t has i been due to the splendid work of the men enlisted in the department To en- able the commissioners to continue 10 obtain men of such high caliber in future years, 1t Is important that they be able to offer such monetary induce ments as are necessary to persuade the right kind of young men, prospec- tive recruits, to enroll in the depart ment Without the right kind of men, the most perfect aptaratus and alarm systems are of little avail. Tn this day of continual advancement in the scales of wages In other trades and in the cost of living, 1t Is no more than right and proper that our fire laddes should keep pace.
 There are those hyper-critical ones who see the city's fire department em- ployes sitting about their quarters and
 doing little apparently most of the
 day To them 1t seems an easy life
 and so they reason thus: Easy work, little pay. But they forget the con-
 tinual nervous strain these men are under every minute of the twenty-four
 hours, asleep or awake, uncertain
 whether in a half minutes time they
 will not be dashlng on their way to a
 fire. These critics forget that theirs is semblance of prison life, since they are unable to leave their quarters and
 can not be with their families more than one day out of every ten.
 The salaries that are asked for the
 men are only just and reasonable. Fol . the first grade men a wage scale of $; . a day Is asked, where the scale is now :, $2.4. The first grade men of the DO . lice department now are getting s3.2,
 day and they have fourteen hours N day off with their families. The fire
 men of New York city get $1, 400 a veal = and have thirty-six hours off ever, ' five days. The fire commissioners ar,
 not asking too much and they should N receive the support of the citizens il v their estimates.