The courier-index., 1917-10-19

do so by the Supervisor or some member of the Board They provide also that the Board can discharge any overseer at any time if it is not satisfied with him.
 In the spring the Supervisor visits each overseer, goes over the road With him, explains the work that he wants the overseer to do and di- rects the way in which it is to be done, IT necessary. After the over- seers begin work the Supervisor visits them as often as possible, watches their work, notes the num- Der and kinds of teams and the num- Der of men they are working, sees that they do not employ more labor than needed and assists them in get ting results. If an overseer is mak- ing his work cost too much we try to correct the trouble and if we can't correct it we discharge him. The Supervisor is constantly in po- sltion to know whether or not an overseer is doing honest work and by comparing his payrolls with the work he is doing he can determine practically whether or not the pay- rolls are correct. The Supervisor reports the work of the entire county to the President of the Board every Saturday. The President of the Board is familiar with every road in the county and has personally in- spected every piece of work of any importance that has been done since the district was formed, except a little work east of the St. Francis river. The other Road Commissions CTS, J. B. Markham, R. L. Hartley. walter Curtis and T. c. Conner, are in close touch with the work in their sections and they know whether or not the overseers of their respective sections are earning their pay. There is no lack of supervision of the over seers' work.
 The statement of the Commission CTS of Accounts that the overseers' bills for time, labor and purchases are paid by the Secretary of the Board without question or verification is incorrect. The overseers are not allowed to make purchases except when ordered to do so by the Super visor. They do make out their pay rolls. No one could supervise that. If we had to check every overseer's payroll every Saturday we would have to have eighteen supervisors, one to every overseer. As a matter of fact the Supervisor does o K every payroll that he possibly can. The President of the Board signs every check that is paid. He knows from the weekly reports of the Su- pervisor what work each overseer is doing, knows how many teams each overseer is working and about what their pay rolls should be. If he has any doubt as to the correctness of payroll he holds it up until the Su- pervisor can investigate. Every prac- tical means possible is used to verify payrolls. All other bills are allowed by the Board.
 The Commissioners of Accounts state that they think that all ac- counts should be verified under oath and passed upon by the Board or it's President before being paid. Every bill is passed upon by the Board or it's President We do not require all bills to be sworn to be- cause it is not practical, owing to the many small bills and because it would not prevent false statements Men present false statements to the County Court and swear to them, as proven by the number detected by the Judge. It does not prevent overcharging against the county and it would not prevent it against the Road District.
 It is true that the Board gives no bond for the judicious handling of the road funds. Neither does the County Judge give bond for the ju- dicious handling of the county funds. Both, however, are subject to prose cution if they inappropriate funds.
 Finally, the Commissioners of Ac- counts find 1.-two overseers in the western part of the county for the past six months SUMMER MONTHS AT THAT-have drawn out of the road fund over 00"-and they state that even if they did honest work it is not fair or just to the other districts of the county for the Board of Road Commissioners to al low such expenditures of the road funds on two districts to the neglect of the others" The overseers re- ferred to are Slaughter Bunch of Hampton township and Ernest Bunch of Spring Creek township. We will say emphatically that there are no better overseers in the county. They work hard and produce results. Their work has been absolutely sat isfactory to the Supervisor, to the Board and to the tax payers of their townships They have not done any work except that which they were ordered to do by the Supervisor. They have not been paid dollar that they did not earn. As for the work being done in the SUMMER MONTHS' those are the months in which all heavy work is done The Board was justified in spending sS.6Ol during the past six months in Hampton and Spring Creek town ships. The road needed the improve ments and the road tax for those two townships last year amounted to twice thirty six hunderd dollars There was nothing unfair or unjust 4 tho other districts in the Board