The Alaska daily empire., 1921-04-21
ISLANDERS ON BUSINESS MEN
 ARE REPuD|ATED
Commercial Association Re- sents Falsehoods of Non-
 Resident Owned Paper.

1 President Allen Shattueh and other members of the Juneau Com
 mercial Association at the monday luncheon today denounced as fabri-
 cations, made from whole cloth, the | propaganda of nonresident owned newspaper that the business people of Juneau had been negligent in
 the matter of securing a capitol l building for Juneau, or that there
 was any sentiment in this city, in-
 spired by landlords to the govern
 mcnt or otherwise, against the con
 struction of such a building
 Mir. Shattuck said the Juneau
 Commercial Association has 96
 members in good standing, leading
 business and professional men of the city, who are fully awake to the importance of anything that count
 ed for the advancement of the city or of Alaska and that they had been doing all that apparently could be done. MT. Shattuck said heI spoke for every member of the Ju- neau Commercial Association.
 John w. Troy gave a history of the whole Juneau capitol building matter from the authorization of the construction of public build ing at Juneau at a cost not to ex- ceed $200, 900, an authorization that was placed in the public buildings bill of 1910 by Senator Warren of Wyoming at the personal request of < President Taft, down to the present time. It showed that the people of Juneau at all times worked wig ilantly to secure a building, acting always according to their best light at the time the action was taken. He showed that, before the Super vising Architect of the Treasury De- partment had reached the Juneau building, Congress had established a Territorial Legislature, and it be came the general conviction of all those in the Territory who looked into the matter that the money ap- propriated was not sufficient A campaign was started in 1913 to se- cure an additional appropriation. This campaign was. at the point of success n11916, when, on account of the war preparation, appropria- | lion, there was no public buildings bill passed, and there has been none since that time.
 MT. Troy also showed that it | would take aation by Con gress to make the $175,000 already author iZed for the construction of a build ing available; that the Supervising Architect, at the request of Gov Riggs and Delegate Grigsby, had agreed to prepare plans for the con- struction of a building, one unit of which could be erected at a cost of $175,000, that it might serve as basis to get Congress to pass special bill or resolution authoriz- ing such action and making the money available for that purpose. Il
 He said he had associated almost daily for eight years with Charles Goldstein, B. M. Behrends, the off cers of the First National Baak, end the officials and members Uf the Odd Fellows Lodge, who are -he principal government landlords, and
 ' iiO hau never HeaIu duS one intimate that there should be ,'elay in the construction of capitol building, but on the contrary every : one of the landlords was just as : much interested as all the other : citizens of the town in getting suitable building erected John Reck. President of taa First Naational Bank. corroborated "eve~v word uttered by MT. Troy and AIr. Shattuck