The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1910-02-18
A FEW COLD FACTS ABOUT THE 20 YEAR WATER CONTRACT AND
 MR. KEATING'S DEFENSE OF IT

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 In order to get a right that the city already had MT. Heating and his committee made the 20 year contract.
 What was the consideration for that contract?
 Plainly. nothing.
 "Ah!" said MT. Keating's com mittee to the water company, you see that under the contract with Nathaniel Greene we are entitled to water as cheap as anybody gets it."
 'Yes," the company replied. you are''
 So they signed new contract.
 And that. contract not only does not provide water as cheaply as other cities get it, but it cuts off the right of Bridgeport to have the advantage of any reduced rates panies to other cities during the next 20 years.
 MT. Heating admits that this city is entitled to as cheap water as any other city supplied by a pri- vate corporation, and lie says that the city has such rate. This is not true, but if it were true, does he claim that during all the years to come no private water company will make a further reduction of rates? And if some company does do this, does not his contract cut this city off from the right to the same rates?
 And we come now to those meters. the responsibility for which MT. Keating very evidently wishes to avoid, for he says ''the company positively refused, al- though requested by the commit tee, to waive its right. as previ- ous1y exercised. to meter whenever and wherever it was deemed neces- sary, to prevent waste of water"
 Why, then, in his report, did Mir. Heating plead for meters, urge their value, virtually demand their installation, and make a provision, in the very contract itself. for the compulsory metering of consum- CTS?
 Why did he not in that report state that he had requested the company not to meter"?
 Lest we forget let us go back to his report printed in the year book and see what this committee real Iy did to "stop the waste of Wa ter.''
 Representing the people of Bridgeport and the city, it went out to bargain for them. Went out to make a better bargain for them than they had. and came back with an indictment of an en- tire population, charging a, wilful waste of water.
 And what was the proof of waste. It was that each person in Bridge port used more water per day than ies in this vicinity.
 There was no other proof. Mir. Keating's committee found that each person in Bridgeport consumed 22S gallons of water a day.
 That each person in sprinfgeld consumed 150 gallons day.
 That each person in Woonsocket, R. T., consumed 2s gallons a day. That the average consumption
 
 gallons a day
 But, mind you, the Bridgeport Hydraulic Company had stored this water. and the people were paying for it liberally, and the company was reaping an enormous profit from the sale of it.
 Then, Mr. Keating's committee having declared the sinfully ex- travag gant and wasteful disposition of the people whose agents they were, and whose interests they were sent to protect, praised me- ters, made meters compulsory at the option of the company, and fixed meter rates in this way:
 So that a family of five persons would have to pay for the same quantity of water they had always used, 22s gallons per person per day, STA per year instead of about S15
 MT. Keating's committee decided that the people of Springfield were wastctul. They decided that the people of most of those other 13 cities were wasteful and they fixed the meter rates so that a family of five persons, using only 70 gal Ions per person per day, would have to pay s25.20 per year.
 But the real idea of the commit tee as to the amount of water that the people of Bridgeport should consume is expressed by the mini mum meter rate of $1050 provided in the contract, which is the price for a family of five persons, on the amount of water used in Woon- socket, where the per capita con- sumption was the lowest the com mittee could anywhere find.
 And then followed the most re- markable reason ever given by a body of public servants for chok- ing off the water supply of a peo- pie.
 The committee said. "If the peo- pie will stop wasting water, the pressure on the mains for fire pur-.. poses will be increased