Norwich bulletin., 1912-12-14

An amendment to the city charter to put the city court on salary basis as regards the city attorney and the judge, the fixing of street sprinkling assessments, the granting of the pe- tition of the Connecticut company for the Boswell avenue trolley layout, and the fixing of grade on Fourteenth street were matters before tsa ad- journed meeting of the court of con- mon council on Friday night.
 Mayor T. c. Murphy called the meet ing to order at S.10 o'clock with all members present except Alderman Me Laughlin, Councilmen Baker and Kramer, when the roll was called by Clerk Stephen D. Moore.
 There were about a dozen men in the spectators seats, including Cor poration Counsel J. T. Tanning, Civil Engineer George E. Pitcher. Manager Samuel Anderson and Engineer Dun ham of the Connecticut company and others interested in the Boswell avenue trolley extension.
 Established Sidewalk Grade.
 The first matter was the hearing on the establishment of a sidewalk grade on 14th street. No one appeared, the hearing was declared closed and the grade established by the adoption of the resolution.
 This was followed by a report from Corporation Counsel Tanning on the petition for the annexation of Sunny side on Laurel Hill to the city. He recommended that the council give ap- proval to the petition and this was voted.
 Charter Amendment on City Court.
 Mayor Murphy then presented the resolutions which he said were in tended to stop much criticism he had heard of the fee system long in vogue in the city court. The resolutions were the following:
 Resolved, That. this court of common council does hereby approve the plan of having the charter of the city amended so that 1t will provide for the compensation of the city attorney to be by salary and not by fees and so that the salary of the judge of the city court shall be fixed entirely by provision of the charter; and
 Resolved, That it is the opinion of this council that the salary of the city attorney should not be more than twelve hundred dollars a year and that the salary of said judge should be fixed at twelve hundred dollars a year.
 Resolved, That the corporation coun- sel be, and he is hereby directed to take such action as may be required to give effect to the foregoing resolu- tions.
 The resolutions were at once adopt
 Assessments for SprinkIing.
 The committee made report on as- rne @r e., past year, which had cost in total $4,- O7I51, and recommended that two thirds of this amount, or $2,718.34, be assessed on the property owners bene- fitted. The committee consisted -o1 Mayor Murphy, Corporation Counsel Tanning and City Engineer Pitcher The report was adopted.
 Report from Washington Convention Mayor Murphy made a report of his attendance as the city's delegate to the national rivers and harbors conven- tion. He spoke of the emphasis whict the convention placed upon the i'm provement of the Mississippi river, fol which the convention recommended g $50,000,000 appropriation. Mayor Mur- phy spoke of the importance of the Thames river as follows:
 IL 10 my OPAAlAOAl Illdl IlSAl IlcIt II our own city we have river whose privileges some people fail to realize In looking back 25 years we see tha' the Thames was used more than al the present time. In those days wC saw boat loads of freight of all de. scriptions unloaded at our docks, em- ploying many men at good wages, say. ing nothing of the thousands of ton: of coal that were unlOaded at thu wharves where we now have dock, 1 that are neglected and rotting "The older inhabitants of this cit! will remember when the ship building was carried on in Thamesville and sev eral steamers as large as the Chelse; were built, also when we had direc line of ships from the West Indies t i our docks on Market street. Now, in | steadA of utilizing our river, we hav' abandoned it to a great extent. Ther I is no merchant or manufacturer il Norwich, or it's vicinity. who does no know that our railroad capacity ha. been taxed to it's limit, and that is on