Norwich bulletin., 1913-02-15
MUNICIPAL LIGHT THAT PAYS. How Winnipeas Has Reduced Lighting
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How Winnipeag Has Heuoeeo LtGnefn9
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 h western or prairie Canada the provinces. cities. towns, and villages. extensively own and operate public utilities, such as telephones, electric and naturai-eas works. Mostly the system Is profitable and the services good. The latest evidence of this is afforded by the first annual report on the Winnipeg civic light and power plant and service According to the Manitoba Free Press. winnipeg's chief daily, the business has proved satis- factory beyond the most sangaine ex- pectations." The whole undertaking is already on a sound profit-naSiEg basis, though but little more than year in operation.
 Ono City Alert in Business.
 Cash receipts for calendar year ending last December amounted to $ses.s1o. increasing month by month from s11s8 for January to- ss7.Sooo for estimated at $6oo, ,ooe. As a business of *35,O0G per month sufi1ces to put the whole civic plant paying basis allowance being duly made for sink ing fund, depreciation, and all opera ting and. wage expenseS-it is clear that the department is now making handsome profits. The actual Toad" or current used increased from 200o horse power in January, 1912, to over 14,000 last month. Considering that all manner of facilities were being pro- vided during the year, in city or high wages where labor is necessarily in demand far greater than the supply; having regard to the confusion that might be reasonably expected of hastening operation after construction; reflecting also on the newness and con stant increase of the employed Stans as we'll as on the clamor of the people h 1Sr-z. sr, 1tc <afr rho record is most encouraging.
 Five thousand poles were erected during the year. over one million pounds of wire stretched on them, one of conduit laid TwQ hundred and seventy five feet of Underground cable. six hundred and thirty-eight street lamps, and two hundred and seventy five new multiple lights were installed. At the years end Winnipeg had two thousand two hundred and sixty eight street lights all told. Nearly twenty thousand separate services are now provided. and new ones are being run as fast as they can be handled Orders are far in advance. more are constantly pouring in, extensions to plant are needed and cannot be furnished as fast as required to satisfy ordinary business demands. Manager J. G. Glassco asked for more money to rush construction of new plant. The City Council hast ened to grant every demand. not sticking an instant over consideration that work in winter is vastly more costly than in summer in that climate.
 Successes in Public Ownership.
 Public ownership and operation of civic and provincial utilities has been so far triumphantIy successful in Can -ada's great West The automatic tel ephone service of Edmonton. is ex- cellent, so is that of Calgary. so the whole telephone service of Alberta. and Saskatchewan Same story true of street cars, gas lighting. etc Out there the people have wholly freed themselves of what there seems an Eastern delusion that capable and hon. est men cannot be found to carry on services essentially simple and stand ardized while turning over the profit to public treasuries. Years ago Ed monton. Vancouver, Calgary. and other cities abandoned the preposterous tax ation system which mulcts build ings and other Improvements They stopped levying business taxes" and stuck all on the land. Under this only so but they tow all Canada in their wake Toronto. though Tory. has just voted overwhelmingly against con- tinuance of her antiquated municipal tax-system- Much against Sir James Whitney's bulldog-like conservatism the whole Province of Ontario is plain 1y on the way to adoption of the single tax by municipalities. a local op- ton plan.
 Again, the more the people practise public operation of public utilities, the more they incline to go further on that line. Ontario operates prof1tably a great railway, though 1t traverses what was all wilderness a few years ago-this is the Ontario & Temisca- mingue road, which will be pushed to Hudson Bay before long. The Do- minion Governments Intercolonial Railway, though so many millions have been sunk in it that earning interest on the whole cannot be regarded as practicable, has of late years paid a fair surplus on operation. It is quite on the cards that the Ottawa Govern ment of MT. R. l.. Borden, if the Grand Trunk Pacific Company shall agree to or give reason for the policy, may take over and operate the Eastern Division, eighteen hundred miles long, between Winnipeg and Moncton. N. B.
 Old Criticisms Ever New
 Of old, when the joint-stock princi- pie or method began to be conspicuous In the Anglo Saxon worlds business, 1t was commonly objected that never, never, never. could employees on sala- ries and wages be found capable of serving as well and profitably "the Maste@' and his celebrated eye" To which the reply of progressives then was that prac ctice on the joint stock method would breed continually more ] and more men capable of working it aQNant8SeOUSiy. A hun0reQ years ago, 1 or eighty or seventy-as one learns from persuing the old discussions-the much-revered Master was regarded IS a man who could be trusted to be always on his job. He has been ex- tensively replaced by the mere Capital lst,sa being who finances the concern l leaves its operation to the salaried, and Himself goes in for luxury. travel. sport, 1 tashion. and various sorts of loafng. 1 10 things have come to this question why cannot the salaried and hired, l who run pretty much all business any way nowadays, run it as well for the public as for a joint-stock company or a capftalistic boss?
 The joint-stock method has. just as vas predicted, bred. in pretty much all departments of utility the talents and n1aracters necessary to further it. Hence, just as was also prophesied by fbjecting great-fathers the world keems headed straight for general pub tc ownership and operation with Aus naiia and New Zealand far ir the lead France and Germany well forward. Great Britain catching up. Canada's prairie west getting a rapid move on md the United States of America, once