The Telegraph-courier. [volume] (Kenosha, Wis.) 1888-1946, 1916-03-30
Taxation without Representation.

Kenosha is in favor of good roads
but the people of Kenosha are not in
| favor of taxation without representa-
ton
The new tangled idea of the towns
in the county issuing bonds for the
building of permanent roads is some
thing that may well prove of great in
terest to the people of the city. Bonds
have bothersome habit of coming in
for payment and someone must pay
them. The town Of Pleasant Prairie,
the town of Bristol and all of the other
six towns in the county may vote bonds.
True enough they are going to pay
some of them but the analysis of the
|condition brings home rather forcibly
the fact that the city of Kenosha is
going to go long way when it comes
to retiring the principal on these bonds.
Kenosha councils are so well educated
in the easy methods of issuing bonds
| that it looks like joke to be forced
to call on the towns of the county to
laid in increasing the bonded indebted
ness of the city. Now when Pleasant
Prairie votes to issue bonds in the sum
of 100000, Pleasant Prairie under the
/ law only obligates the town to pay one
third of this amount. The other two
thirds must be paid by the state and
county. Most people have by this time
learned that when the state pays road
money it collects it from the county
first and that when the county lays
i tax levy to get this money it levies the
lion IS share of it against the city. In
lother words, when Pleasant Prairie
votes to levy 100000 for bonds for
good roads, it votes to levy tax
J against the people of Kenosha to pay
off some forty thousand dollars worth
of these bonds. Kenosha might stand
another $4,000 bond issue, but when
i it is remembered that all towns in the
county have the same right as Pleas
ant Prairie, the people of the city might
well sit up and take notice. Tt may
be constitutional and legal for the town
of Pleasant Prairie to vote bonds to be
ipaid by the other towns and the city
but we question the moral right. Ke-
nosha has been liberal in the support
of the road building work. Since the
first macadam road was built in the
Icounty the city has come across regally.
i nj than sixty thousand dollars has
I been levied for road taxes in Kenosha
and not a cent of the money spent with
in the corporation limits. This is show
ing the helpful hand to the neighbor-
ling territory and it undoubtedly has
been of great benefit to the city of Ke-
nosha to levy these taxes. However it
does look reasonable that the city
should have some representation in say
l. ing the amount of the road tax that is
to be levied against it. When the
lcounty board leyies road taxes the city
has some nine members who are en-
titled to vote on the levy. These nine
members should have some way to get
a vote as to the amount Of bonds that
pheasant Prairie and the other towns
are to issue.
If bond issues are to be made for
the Improvement of roads, it seems on
lily fair that they should be bonds is
sued by the county for the improve
ment of roads in all parts Of the county
and the members of the county board
should show some consideration of the
)city in making the amount of these
bond issues. Taxing posterity has be-
come entirely too easy in Wisconsin.
1t is possible under the present state
laws for towns to foist such bonds
upon city; the laws should be amend
ed SO as to give the people who are to
pay the bonds more representation in
the issuing of them.
| Sane road building is all right but
the amount of the city's contribution
to the building Of the roads in the
county should in some measure at least
be dictated by the officials of the city.
| Kenosha has been going along pretty
twell with her road building with. an
Inual appropriations made by the coun-
lty board. The rush into the bond field
is a bad precedent. It is piling up the
| Indebtedness on the city without a
proper warrant
| Let's have good roads, but let us
build them within our means and with
out placing hard burdens on the gener-
ations which are to follow. In the
road building games let's keep on the
cash basis. It may take little longer
to get all the roads improved but it
will bring improvement with the salts
faction that when the roads are com
pleted they are paid for and that the
cost of them is not going to continue
to be a mile stone about the necks Of
future city councils and town boards
for decade to come.