The Twin Falls times. [volume] (Twin Falls, Idaho) 1905-1916, 1913-05-30
STATE UTILITIES
COMMISSION firm
Will Not Grant Passes for State
Employees.
BELIEVE LETTER AND SPIRIT OF
LAW SHOULD BE OBEYED.
Application for Transportation of For.
est Fire Fighters Is Denied to Lum-
bermen's Association.

sion put the ban on pass giving with
IN this state in one Of its first rulings
when. the lumber corporations of the
panhandle were turned down on an
application for transportation of for
esters and forest fire fighters. The
letter giving the reasons for denying
the application contains sound sense
and should give the public greater
confidence in the value of the COM
mission. The letter is herewith given:
May %, 1918.
MIR. w. D. Humiston,
Sec'y. and Treas. Potlatch Timber
Protective Assn,
Potlatch, Idaho.
Dear Sir: Your letter of the 14th
instant, in which you request that the
public utilities commission of this
state enter general order permitting
common carriers of the state to issue
passes to fire wardens and their dep
ut1es, was duly received. The reply
to your letter has been delayed on ac-
count OF the mass of correspondence
TO which the commission has had to
give attention since its organization.
Under the public utilities act passed
by the recent legislature, common car
r1ers within this state are forbid
den to give free transportation to any
one, with the certain exceptions usu-
ally in bills of this character, 1t is
provided, however, in the act, that
nothing therein shall prevent the is
suance of free transportation to the
members of the public utilities COM
mission and such state officials as the
commission may direct.
The reasons you give as to why the
fire wardens and their deputies should
nave free transportation are quite
plausible, and it WOULD seem that If
any officials in this, state should be
granted free transportation, it should
be such officers.
1t Is questionable, in our minds, If
the fire wardens and their deputies
are state officials and come within the
clause above referred to, providing
that the commission may direct that
free transportation may be given to
state officials.
But, aside from this, we believe that
the policy of the state legislature of
Idaho in recent years has been to
check the practice of granting passes
to persons by common carriers,
The legislature of the session of
1903 enacted a statute prohibiting
common carriers from granting passes
to the governor and many state Off
cials, as well as the supreme and dis
tr1ct judges of the state. This law
had never been repealed up to the last
session of the legislature, and in fact
has never been directly repealed ex-
cept In so far as the clause contained
in the recent public utilities act,
above referred to, may do so by impli-
cati<7o
IEEf were the intention of the legis-
lature to extend to the commission the
prerogative of continuing the policy
embodied in the statute of 1909. afore-
said, or modifying the same by re-
commenAng@ passes to be given to
state officials, 1t is our opinion, con-
sidering the policy heretofore begun
by our state legislature by the act
aforesaid (Which is in keeping with
that OF many other states in recent
years.. that the policy thus begun
should be pursued, and that the grant
Ing OF free transportation by common
carriers should not be extended but
should be substantially abolished,
We believe that it will be best for
all concerned If such course is fol-
lowed. We shall. therefore, have to
decline to grant the request contained
in your letter.
Respectfully yours, ~
PUBLIC UTILITIES COMMISSION On {
THE STATE OF IDAHO. ="
J. A. BLOMQUIST,
A. P. RAMSTEDT.
D. W. STANDROD,
Commiaafonera