The Bridgeport times and evening farmer., 1920-12-28

There is a well-grounded impress sion prevalent today that the Com fmou Council will be asked to send tpetidon to the Legislature requesting ithat the bonding limit of the city be raised above the present five per cent. limit on the grand list so that the city may be authorized to issue bonds for ithe schools as asked by the Board of Education That was the consensus | of opinion after the hearing on the matter before the Ways and Means ,committee of the Common Council last night, although only 25 of those interested in the question of bonding Bridgeport for $2,7G0,000 to provide adequate school facilities appeared before t5e committee.
 The Chamber Of Commerce was : represented by President D. Fair child Wheeler Secretary Seward B. | Price. William T. HinckS and Percy T. Litchfield, all of whom spoke in favor of the proposition while former William F. Hogan expressed the be- lief that if the present buildings and facilities were used to their capacity 1t would not be necessary to make so great an outlay.
 | Dr., Alfred c. Zones of the Board Of Education also appeared in favor of the petition.
 The apathy which governed the , proceedings seemed to have affected the aldermen of the committee, a conspicuous exception being Chair man Stone. who piled some of the ex- ports with questions. The only other alderman who evinced the slightest Interest in the proceedings was Al derman Brown, who contented him self with two questions.
 Secretary Price reported that 100 members of the Chamber of Com merce who had visited every school In the city had found 5000 children who are not getting the proper kind of training because of limited school facilities. He said at least 40 rooms lcosting about S12,000 each are neceS- sary to provide these children full time instruction. The Chamber un- qualif1edly endorsed the issue of bonds.
 s MT. Price stated that the specific program for a bond issue of $2,OOOOO sa1ad not as yet been presented to the < membership so on that score he could not speak for the Chamber either for or against it.
 An illuminating address was deliv- cred by William T. Hincks, who said in part:
 we ought to agree to provide ad- ;eouate and proper accommodations for all children that want to go to ,school. I heard the chairman ask MT. Price whether he thought we ought to extend our bond limit. There isn't any magic l know of about 5 per cent debt limit. We have only had it in the state some seven or eight years, if 1 recall rightly. It Is true that it prevailed in a great many other states. is true that our s@v- dngs bank law which regulates the investment of savings bank funds in bonds outside of Connecticut provides that these funds shall not be invested in bonds of cities which have a debt limit of more than 5 per cent. That was regarded as a proper debt limit in many other ways for any city, but many substantial cities are indebteS
 y,T r~T-r, ,E list
 Tt is usually in the case of rapidly growing cities that the larger debt limit exists. For instance, Norfolk Va, which has had very rapid growtf in the last few years. is indebted about seven or eight DOT cent. There are plenty of other good cities tha' feel the 5 per cent. limit is no great barrier Our legislature has pre- scribed that for a definite debt limit for all cities in Connecticut. We can't go beyond that without per ln:reion of the Legislature.
 What we sometimes overlook i: the serious question. of whether ol not we are beyond that limit alread! in point of fact. We have a grand list of roughly $230,O0o,0O0 in Bridge list ofNs1S7, 100000. Taking those figures, we are on an infinitely more expanded and inflated valuation thai
 New Haven. I will challenge any
 body to take a motor car and drivt around the two cities and be toIt that Bridgeport property is wortl
 one-third more than New Haven
 Albany is a pretty elaborate city, ant
 If you tell the average resident o
 Albany that we have a richer cit
 than they have, his patrician nos
 would go up in the air, yet the granC
 list of Albany is only S107, ,000
 and Albany is only q little smalle
 than Bridgeport.
 of our grand list is calculated on
 higher basis than those of other cit
 les, then we are right up against tn