The Birmingham age-herald., 1915-04-09
Must Be Compensated

of payment of the full value.
 Must Be Compensated 1 In view of this situation. the note says l the American owners must be compen. 1 sated for their loss. It is pointed out however, that the case must go into a
  of the bond issue you had voted was | Illegal and so we started in $300, 900 be- hind.
 Operating under the old laws passed in 1875 when Birmingham was village, the commission took this town with it's | 25000 school children, it's 2O00 miles of streets, it's 1000 miles of alleys, it's 300
 miles of sewers. it's 1920 street lights, it's 1920 employees and tried to make both ends meet. We couldn't do it!
 Mistake Cost S4000
 1 ''fhe mistake of a single clerk in the
 engineering department cost us s40OO at one swoop. We had cut salaries to what | seemed to be the limit But we saw that wouldn't do. We had to have some high class and high salaried men in the diff ferent departments of the city. Take for instance the street commissioner. Well not say Gafford. for I know some of you don't like Gafford but we'll say the street commissioner and call him Air. A. He has charge of from 150 to 175 convicts, he keeps in repair 2O00 miles of streets How much is 2000 miles of streets? Somebody get up and tell me! Well, it's a whole lot more than the distance from here to Washington. Now how much would you pay a man to do that? Hun dred dollars month. you say. All right now listen. In addition to that this MT. A every week takes 200 mules and wagons and crews and gathers the gar- bage from over g, ,0O0 places in this city {; he operates the most modern jail in the south which cost the city $S2, 900; he su- pervises the city farm on which are raised every vegetable the convicts eat; he has charge of the blacksmith shop where the city's mules are shod and the repair shops where the wagon bodies are made and the automobiles of the city kept in order. Now what would you pay that man? Well, add just $50 more to the $100 and you'll have Gaffords s salary Where's the man in this hall that will stand up and say It is too much?
 Then on top of all this operating ex pense you citizens have been coming to us for four years and demanding inn provements-and you had right to de- mand them. You kicked about the dust. How many sprinkling carts do we need? ? We've got 15. That's one-tenth of what we need
 The East Birmingham Case ''Out here in East Birmingham in one night 20 houses burned to the ground and 150 people were made homeless. In the face of conditions like that do you blame us for spending $s2,000 in motorizing the fire department? When your house catches fire do you want the department right now or next week? Did we do right in building several new stations in different parts of the city? If we did are you go- ing to pay for them?
 Now we have put ourselves in shape to buy the Birmingham Waterworks plant After considerable litigation and maneuvering for position, you voted us a few months ago four and a half million dollars for bonds to build our own water works. Things began to get too hot for the waterworlSs company and they came across with fair rates and an offer to let us buy their plant whenever we want to. Now we can take our choice and buy this waterworks plant, build one ot our own or condemn this one In working out the great engineering problems in- volved in this water question, in guaran- teeing to you that the water you drink no matter how you get it is pure and wholesome, do you want a $15O0 man as city engineer? Do you want a novice to do that, or do you want an expert, trained and efficient engineer? If you do, you've got to pay him, and then do you say we are paying too much for salaries 'Where's the anti bond issue man in this crowd who will get up on his feet and say what should be paid a man who can do that work for the city. Brother Truss, stand up, What is he worth $l500 year?"
 Could Get S25O0- Man
 MT. Truss. arising: "No sir. I would say more than that. But you could get man to do 1t for s25o0.'
 Well. can you run this city on si5O, ,0oO a year? That's what we get to do it with from our legitimate revenues. For the rest we have to rob the business men of Birmingham through the means of license tax. Rob em And we do it because we have to. Run Felix Black burn or Tom Mcdonald or Walter Moore for commissioner. All these candidates for the city commission this fall, what will they do you if they are elected? understand you've got a couple of fel- lows out here who are running. Did you ever hear about that fellow who ran just l to hear the rattle? Let's inseribe the names of all these candidates a scroll and frame it for future generations! When they get through running for com- l missioner, you'll have to search the uni verse for their remains
 Are you surprised that we owe this | money? Where's the man here who has not known every day of the four years | that we were running mp this debt ye, | you say you are not going to pay for iti
 I don't believe it. You are going to pay | for it: you'll not listen to that bunch of knockers and seoffers who have beer ] hammerng away al it for these foui years. that bunch that put all this debt
 on you suburbs, that bunch tha' awarded contracts for public work with out competitive bidding,
 'I smoked en out at Ensley, Out al 1 Ensley I called 'em lScSers and knockers and insects and immediately they came
 back at me and acknowledged it. By
 mentioning Walter Moore and FeliS
 Blackburn and Tom Mcdonald, though
 don't mean that that's all of em. but it is the backbone of the crowd. They the behind all of this stir.
 "Why don't they go before the legs lature and have the commission bill re pealed and go back to the aldermanit | or anything else which they wish, Whs 1 don't you, Brother Truss. why don't Feli, and Tom and Walter go before the com | mttee now meeting in Birmingham anc present their views?
 Mir Truss: T think will.''
 References to Blackburn
 "I went before the committee as ( representative of you tax payers and
 told them that we'd be satisfied witt nothing short of equalization of taxes Felix Blackburn is hollering equalization of taxes, that's his argument against tho
 bond issue. he tries to make you believe i But why don't he go before this com mittee instead of trying to defeat tn,
 bond issue which has nothing to do witt it? I have heard him refer to the stink Ing fund don't know who put him ul to that, | don't know what are his mo