Los Angeles herald., 1910-08-12
POLITICS AND PUBLIC
WORK

roads advisory committee to the
n investigating committee, which is
now looking into the affairs of the
highway commission, published in
yesterday mornings Herald, ought to
show our readers what the people of
Los Angeles escaped when by their
votes ousting the Harper administra-
tion they succeeded in keeping the
construction of their aqueduct out of
| politics.
This great public work, by being
kept out of politics, has made a record
for both rapidity and economy of con-
struction. In the aqueduct work the
task of bringing water for two and a
half million people distance of $50
miles was begun about November l,
| 1907, and has been under construction
less than three years. In that time
it has been 65 per cent completed, and
! there has already been saved upon the
completed part more than a million
dollars.
The spending of three and a half
million dollars in building 915 miles of
good roads in our county was author
lied more than two years ago, and for
two years past abundance of money
has been at the command of the poll
ticians in charge of this work. No
part of the work worthy the name has
| been completed. A few short stretches
of highway, none more than two or
three miles in extent, have been turned
over to the people, but nearly all of
the work is uncompleted, and most
of it not even begun, although two
years have elapsed. Why this is so
is probably told by the communication
of the highway commission to the in
vestigating committee, most of which
has thus far, at the request of the
highway commission, been suppressed,
but a small portion of which was
quoted in the communication of the
f-advisory committee published in The
Herald.
| Mr.. Bixby, the chairman, speaking
for the commission, makes a very sig
nificant admission when he says
81 ACCEPTED DISAPPOINTMENT
ON THE COMMISSION AND WAS
| CHOSEN CHAIRMAN. 1 FREELY
| ADMIT THAT THIS ACTION IN
| VOLVED Me AT ONCE IN PARTI-
SAN ALIGNMENT WITH THAT
FACTION OF MY PARTY REPRE-
| SENTED BY THE MAJORITY OF
THE MEMBERS OF THE BOARD
(OF SUPERVISORY AND OPPOSED
BY THE SO-CALLED LINCOLN
ROOSEVELT OR REFORM FAC
| TION. so SAW NOTHING
PARTICULARLY T RIFYING
AND TOOK 1T UNDER A PLEDGE
| OF DIVISION OF PARTISAN SPOILsI
-HARDLY-NOR CAN FEEL
| THAT MY COLLEAGUES DID, NOW
THAT I KNOW THEM so WE'LL"
The Herald is prepared to state as
a fact that as one result of the pledge
of division of partisan spoils" the high
way commission, at the dictation of
| Supervisor McCabe, dispensed with the
services of a clerk who had served it
almost since its organization, with
whose service the commission were so
entirely satisfied that they wished to
retain him, but who was removed at
the demand of Supervisor McCabe to
put in a clerk selected by that gentle
man.
The pitiful result, or rather lack of
result, achieved by the highway COM
mission in the more than two years
during which they have had abundance
of funds at their disposal, and the
fact that the little work they have
done is shown TO have cost a great
deal in excess of the estimate upon
which the bonds were issued, speak
more eloquently than anything else
can of what it means to the public TO
have public work mixed with politics.
The only way out of the trouble is for
the people to turn their backs on
Supervisor Eldridge at the coming pri-
maries and nominate a man who will
break up the solid three of infamous
repute in the board of supervisors, and
will, with the other two honest, pa
triotic members of that board, form a
"solid three" who will insist that the
work of the public being done by the
highway commission shall not be mixed
up with partisan politics.