The Idaho Republican. [volume] (Blackfoot, Idaho) 1904-1932, 1916-05-05
BLACKFOOT AS SHE is
Half clean and oderyha Uttered up and 6ysrees and alleys
neglected-ciy officials lacking courage to act

deity ofhclals lacking courae
OF leaves and rubbish adjoining the
from views of some of the fashion
ably inclined and the unassuming
poor of the Grove City, 1t wouldn't
look SO very bad in the paper. It
would be when people walked around
and looked at the property itself
that they would be shocked.
See It
Anywhere
Why folks, right along Main
street, a person can get glimpses of
such ill-kept places it would turn
stranger against the town, and ii
he walked half block back either
way from Main, il he went up the
alley or down or just stood at the
sidewalk and took slanting look,
where. there ought to be beautiful
perspective (guess that's the name OF
it, there are loads and loads OF
ashes, piles Of manure, old buggy
tops that haven't moved for years,
old boxes, brush, timbers, bottles,
TIN cans, old BUILDINGS that are tumb-
ling down and useless, old clothes,
piles of rags, old mattresses abso-
lutely rotting with age, dead cats,
dead hens, baling wire, barrel hoops,
old bricks, tree tops, old stumps, old
crates with nails sticking up, loads
of hay piled against fire-trap build
ings, COW pens with manure many
inches deep and In places several
years old, papers lodged in between
buildings till they are a fire menace
in dry weather and creating odors
in wet weather. We can't print the
pictures of the odors, so everybody
is safe on that count.
Some Don't
Like 1t
Some folks are going to say we
are knocking on the town and so
we are. But the town is ripe to
stand some knocking and be physi-
cally improved by the process. II
we had had few city councils with
spine enough to enforce the laws in
years gone by, the publication Of this
article would not have been neces-
sary, and good many cases of ty-
phoiu and other diseases would have
been saved.
We're Afraid
To
It would be bad journalistic policy
to criticise the present city council
and to say they have not yet reached
the point where they showed life.
We wouldn't do that for anything.
for If we did they would feel harder
toward us than they do. We told
the public a year ago that it would
have a hard time selecting one eff
ficient council from the two sets that
were in nomination, and we believe
now that the major portion of the
public will agree that we were right.
The only creditable thing the council
have done in the year has been to
start a job of street paving, and al
tho they began that in the fall and
had time enough to complete the pre-
liminaries and wait for spring, they
have made so many blunders and had
to back up SO many times, they are
not ready to lay paving yet and prob
ably will not be for weeks to come.
Can't Govern What
We Have
The council or part of them, want
to build a power plant. We suggest
that they prove their ability to in
stall the dead hens in proper graves
and remove the dead cats from the
alleys before worrying about the in
tricacies of power plants. True, the
hens and cats are not sinking so
much that many people observe it,
neither is the proposed municipal
lighting plant crying to heaven. How
ever, there are alleys on this first
day of May, where it is just a sue
cession of ash piles, manure piles
and brush heaps. There are places
where one has to drive over them If
he drives thru. There are pretty
homes with cement walks and curbs
in front, and cart loads of leaves,
ashes, bottles, pebbles, baling wire
and other stuff dumped out in the
street showing that the occupants
Of the place have little or no concep-
ton Of harmony, and as the city gov
eminent permits this thing they can
hardly lay claim to being better than
the people who elected them. This
is not an unfair critism of the coun-
Gil, for it was ever thus in Blackfoot;
today, yesterday and, for anything
we know, will go on forever.
Lazy Mans
Methods
There are many gardens in town
that need fertilizing, and many farm
ers out of town who have been TAX
ing all the manure they could get
and paying price for it. There are