Evening star., 1916-12-06
Tie Evening Star Newspaper Company
lIth st. and Pennsylvania Avenue.
District Estimates and Surplus.

The estimates just submitted by the
District Commissioners are more con-
siderate of the urgent municipal neces-
stiles and more effectively presented
than any that have been sent to
Congress by the present heads of
the District government, including in
their total of $16,961 ,O9266 not only
increases in current maintenance, but
provisions for expanding the munich
PAL equipment, particularly in the
school and police departments and
in the addition of park tracts to the
city's reservation system.
The Commissioners continue to be
confronted in their estimates by the law
of 1909, imposing limitation to the ex-
tent of the prospective District revenues
upon the recommendations sent to Con-
gress. Thus in order to keep their esti-
mates within the limit the Commission
ers. must prune on all sides and choose
between worthy and important projects.
IF the law continues in effect there
should be a provision for the submis-
sion of alternative estimates. In the
present budget the Commissioners, for
example, have recommended the pur-
chase Of two large park tracts at cost
Of . million dollars. In order to leave
q margin for this item the Commission
eYs.shave had to omit others, such as
possibly, for example, the high pressure
fire service for the downtown section,
which has been urgently needed for
years. If the House is infexibly op-
posed to more appropriations for parks
It does not follow that it would be op-
posed to the high pressure service, and
portunity to advance the latter as an
alternative proposition either to the
House itself or to the Senate when that
body comes to consider the estimates.
There should, in fact, be no such limi-
tatien uron the estimating power Of
the Commissioners as to make virtually
inevitable the creation of a surplus of
District funds by the failure of Congress
to approve the specific proposals ad
vaneed by them in their estimates.
The proposition to apply to the Dis
triet's funded debt any surplus that
may remain when the appropriations
have been made is well enough, pro-
vided that the application is made on
the. half -and-half basis as the equities
require. But that is not the only debt
to which such surplus should be ap-
piled There should be some fund in
the Treasury to protect the District
against artifcially concocted debts,
such as those created by the johnson
discoveries Of federal failures in the
past to collect from the District on long
since closed accounts. If these extraor-
dinary and inequitable debts are to be
row collected they should lot be taken
from current revenues, but should be
paid out of sinking funds or special
funds created by surplus revenues
Moreover, any surplus that may be
created by failure of Congress to ap-
propriate up to the limit of the District
revenues on the half-and half basis, in
strict accordance with the terms of the
organic act, which remains in full force,
should be available primarily for cur
rent maintenance in some future lean
year. 1t should go into reserve fund
to equalize the Districts revenues and
liabilities. 1t is conceivable that the cur
rent revenues may not suffice, under a
more liberal system of appropriations
than has lately prevailed, TO meet the
current demand. Instead of going into
debt for the additional funds, as was
done in the case of the provision for
payment of the extraordinary improve
ments a few years ago, the District
should have trust fund in reserve in
the Treasury upon which it may draw,
90 long as it is prevented from borrow
ing money to pay on long term basis
for large permanent works, as is done
In all other cities.