Pine Bluff daily graphic., 1914-11-13
GERMANY FACES
 HOUSING PROBLEM
Reforms Include Municipal
 Campaigns.
CHECK APARTMENT HOUSES.

Country's Measurss Include New Dom.
 icile Laws, Campaign Against iI.gh
 Rents and Residence i-amires ano
 Building of Workmcn's Dwellings.
 Germany has vigorously taken in hand her great housing problem It i> a troublesome task. Bad housing. says Count Posadowsky. former minister oi the interior is the reason why the na tional birth rate has fallen from 42 to 29 per 1000 in the last forty years The absence Of imperial housing iegis lation is one source of the evil
 Other social problems have beel beneficialIy regulated by the bi,ntica rath and reicllstag. but hol,sing l.::..t' been left to the state legislatures, a,l;. these have done very little Their neg lect has caused friction ytsir age pr Delbrnck. who. now holds l'OS; dowsky's portfolio. threatened that it Prussia did not improve her housing. the empire would intervene. This threat made the reformers hurry up The PrusSan and other state yOverE
 ments set to preparing bills. and pri vate organizations and indiv itlualS be gan to compete with them in proposing plans of betterment
 Mainly the refOrmers are lighting the Snnciti1 oyiic wi,i..h q brand new urban civilization Every fifth German lives in a town of over 100000 population. Housing on the
 land is fairly satisfactory. but in the great cities it is worse than in Aneri
 ca, England. Belgium. Holland and in some respects France.
 Germany's broad. straight streets and imposing facades. which arouse foreign admiration. are rich sources
 of evil. for they have brought territ- | caIly high rents. nnhygienic c0nStruc tion and uneXampied overcrowding. This is the fault of the town planners.
 who copied the concentrated building system of Paris and Vienna. d system devised for medieval fortified towns
 and useless for Berlin. which has no Qualifications.
 By planning broad streets and deep | blocks the town planners compelled the construction of five storied apartment ] houses instead of the dispersed one family houses of Americ,.. England. Holland and Belgium. The SD called fiat barracks" dominate. The aver | age Berlin house shelters eighty two | persons ns against seven persons per l house in London and Antwerp. On hygienic social. moral and eco | homie grounds the big apartment | house system is universally condemn ed. The apartment Houses are un- healthy. being excessively hot in sum- l mer. thus conditioning high infant l mortality. Half the apartments look
 nn to airless. iightless courtyardS The working class apartment houses have uo elevators The bad results are 1 proved by the fact that the mortality of women and of sufferers from heart | disease increases with each floor The apartment house prevents the owner ship of q home. turns people into nomads. produces overrrowding and makes for higher rents.
 Germany now will take radical meas ures against these evils. Her methods are three firstly new housing laws; secondly. q campaign ny the m"nici' paltieS against high rentS aud bonsing famines: thirdly. the building of work mems dwellings, out of public funds. s.,A provement of German housing is !'cing exercised by the state social insurance system. The insurance organizations have become capita.izers of the t.ore- ment for providing working class dwell ingS
 In Hanover 4I .Ol)0 WorkmenS x houses have been provided. the homes of about 2l0.0im persons Rerlin's second mayor. Rur-oim,ster Reicke. advo cates q plan of hpuSiiI" iser!inS porn ation out of insurance bureau atttu,n' lationS He stands fer building out side the city Il vast settlement of m,dei working class houses With him iS an other housing reformer. Professor E !Francke. the general secretary ot the StS|CIVtN Tot sNtNitI lNclutil .Ati tiiVSf houses would be owned by their fen ants Rapid underground comnuiiia tionS would hrn" the wurkmen tn the center of the city in twenty minutes.
 Other states than Prussia are le%is. !ating and working in the same direr- ton Bavaria will check the building of apartment houses by changing the police building laws SaXony will pre- vert municipalities favnring the con, stiuction of dear and large apartments to the exclusion of wnrkingmen These state initiatives have checked the dt- nand for an inlperial hnuSing iaw for all Germany. but such d law. say ex
 1ertS. Is hound to come in a few years
 
 Women's Civic Club.
 N'n,non'S (siyi,. ,.lut, borr hu.., nr.