The Bemidji daily pioneer. [volume] (Bemidji, Minn.) 1904-1971, 1914-05-14
Efficiency Board Finds Program As
Outlined by Taft Commission, and
Added To, Is Acceptable.
ESTIMATES GO TO LEGISLATURE
But Department Heads Must First
Request Appropriations Of Director
and Then Governor.

consulting with the best authori.
ties, comparing results with local
conditions, and introducing a few
ideas of his own, DR.. E. Dana Durand
has outlined budget program which
appears to the efficiency commission
about the incest thing of the sort
they have seen.
The Taft commission spent about
100000 and two years time on this
and other studies. A Wisconsin in
vestigation has been published in a
pamphlet as big as the fourth reader
and there are various pamphlets
which contain a great deal of wis
dom.
The budget idea is simple enough.
The head of each department makes
up his estimates, and checks it up
with the head of the big department.
The director goes over it with them,
and when they want more money
they have to show him what for.
He sympathizes with them and gent
ly curbs their excessive ambitions.
The director in turn takes his as
sembled estimates up to the COVER
nor, where the same process is re-
peated
The first day the legislature is in
session, all these estimates are laid
before the Legislature showing what
each branch of the service got in the
last appropriation, how these funds
were allotted and what was done
with them-what they want for the
next two years, and why they think
they ought to have more-and what
they will do with it if they get it..
Such information piecemeal is be-
fore the legislature at present, but
there is no system covering the
whole, no means of comparing in
telligently the needs of the various
departments, and no system of &C
counting that tells-the. legislature
very much about what was done
with the money. To bring all mat
tiers together in budget is the, first
step toward Intelligent appropria-
ton.
Now there is a new wrinkle. Sup
pose a given department asked for
sixty thousand dollars and the bud
get committee shaved it to fifty-five
thousand, and the legislature appro-
PIRATES fifty thousand. If the head
OF that division had got the sixty
thousand he asks for, he would file
his estimate with the auditor, and
that is how he would spend his
money. Cutting it down to fifty
thousand, he will allot that fifty
thousand to various purposes. Pos
sibly the legislature will indicate out
of that fifty thousand, that ten thou
sand shall be spent for this and
twenty Thousand for that, but even
then he will make up his allotment
much more infinitely than is shown
by the legislative appropriation.
He will spend his money under that
allotment just as though it was 50
specified in the appropriation, ex-
cept as long as he keeps within the
limit of the appropriation, he can
change his mind. When he does
change his mind because he finds he
needs more for this end and can get
along with less for that, he will file
with the auditor "a reallotment
which probably will first be approved
10y his superior officer. So you have
on one hand an absolute limit to thu
amount he can spend, or even linn
- it to what he is allowed to spend fol
particular purposes, but considerable
flexibility in the way he shall spent
Following out the budget idea i
has been suggested that the .legisla
tureacan get itself more satisfactor!
results if it will organize its com
mittees on somewhat similar lines
in such form that committee tina
has given special study to the nor
NAL schools will be consulted as t,
the appropriations for the normals
or the committee that is special.
interested in live stock matters will
be consulted as to the appropriation
for the agricultural department.
1t is quite likely that when we ge
things to going the legislature will
find it convenient to modify it's com
mittee structure in that way.
There is no doubt of this-tha
when the state adopts form of gov
eminent like that outlined by tn
efficiency commission, the legisla
ture will be in position to apprc
pirate intelligently as never before
Venezuelan Towns Seized.
Port of Spain, Trinidad, May H.
Venezuelan revolutionists, who are b
lieved to have made their way dow
from the British Guinia frontier. hav
seized the small towns of 1mataca an
Tucupita on the Orinoco river. Th
collector of customs at Imataca is
prisoner. One official Of Tucupita We
shot.