The Twin Falls times. [volume] (Twin Falls, Idaho) 1905-1916, 1910-07-21
FOR BETTER ROADS.
Letter From E. r. Sherman to Gem
State Rural.


al-Journal-Your valued letter
of May 18th and copy of Rural-Jour-
nal at hand | have read all the arti-
cles on good roads in this issue that
and note by your articles and letters
that you have undertaken a great
work
Being president of the Intermoun-
tain Good Roads Association, which
was organized in January last at Salt
Lake City, can assure you that am
more deeply interested in your labors
than anyone, for a great part of the
success of our organization rests with
it's officers. We expect when our or
ganization is completed to have all the
states in the northwest with us. At
present we only have Wyoming, Utah,
and Idaho, but will ask that delegate !
be appointed from Colorado, Montana,
Oregon, Washington and Nevada to at
tend our next meeting which will be
held in Ogden, Utah, on September
23d, oath, and 26th, and we will exert
every effort to have fifteen hundred
delegates at this meeting. We also
expect to have our senators and repre-
sentatives from the northwest present
and we will try and impress upon
them the Importance of congress as
sisting up in this great work We will
ask our government to set aside one
million acres of land in each state to
be sold, the proceeds to be used in
building state roads; we will ask the
legislatures of each state to make APP
preparations for building roads and to
enact laws to tax automobiles, the
proceeds to be used in maintaining
public highways; we will ask the CO.
operation of auto and commercial
clubs in this work With a very large
showing of enthusiastic delegates at
our meeting this work can and will be
started; this will be the work of the
Intermountain Association at its meet
ing in Ogden.
The subject of good roads and how
to get them and how to impress upon
the public in our rural districts the
necessity of building and maintaining
good roads is SO large subject that,
fully discussed, would fill your yalu-
able Journal. There is no one needs
to have impressed upon them the nee
essity of good roads; that is settled
fact. We must first prepare way to
get them; good roads are needed and
good roads cost money. 1t would seem
to me the way to settle this problem is
as taken up by you. The system in
this state is radically wrong. We
should eliminate those old laws and
enact such new ones that when one
thousand or five thousand dollars is
used on roads we will get that many
dollars in roads These new laws will
be presented by the legislative COM
mittee appointed at the County Com
missioners' convention, and as a mem
Der of this committee, | can see that
your labors arc going to be of great
assistance to us, as we can get from
your files IDEAS from the leading men
of all parts of the state and we need
them. Personally, | believe that all
work on roads should be under the SUI
pervision of a county commissioner in
his district, let by contract and speci-
f1cations drawn by county engineer:
this will get the most work for the
money. I also believe that all poll
taxes should be paid into the treasury
and do away with the high priced road
overseer, spending his time warning
out men to work on the road; which is
now and always has been farce, for
the oyerseer could do as much work
while warning out as he gets after he
warns them out. This, perhaps, does
not sound good to some, but in nearly
all cases it is nevertheless true. There
seems to be feeling in this country
| that when a bond election for good
| roads is called, it is a scheme for the
automobiles, but this is not so; it
| would add to the value of the farm far
more than the cost of the roads.
| e. R. SHERMAN
Bull, Idaho.