Perth Amboy evening news., 1922-12-16
EXPLAIN SEWER
F0RMETUCHEN
State Board of Health Officials
Point Out Needs for
Improvement

METUCHEN, Dec. 16.-The tax
payers of Metuchen who met last
night in Legion Hall to hear officials
of the State Health Board explain
the proposed sewer system for this
borough were almost unanimous in
endorsing the action of the borough
council in authorizing the prepara-
ton plans for fourteen miles OF
sewer here.
The first speaker was P. N. Dan
iels, sanitary engineer of the State
Board of Health. who told of the
menace of cesspools in any commun-
ity Not only is there danger of
these cesspools overlooking, but they
attract flies in the summer times. he
said and the flies in turn carry dis
ease to the homes. Mr.. Daniels said
that the cost of the project would
not be allowed to interfere with its
being completed maintaining that
health of the community is at stake
and the saving >of a few lives would
be worth the expenditure of thous-
ands of dollars.
Residents of the borough living
on the outskirts, may oppose the
sewer idea, the speaker said, but
he pointed out that they too are in
as much need of sewers to replace
cesspools as are those persons liv-
ing in the thickly populated section
of the borough. Even in cases
where the cesspools are as far as
one mile distant from the homes,
the occupants of these houses are
not immune from disease which
Light be carried to them in their
drinking water, obtained from wells
or spread by means of flies.
Sewer installation, the engineer
declared, means a lower death rate
and a general improvement in the
health conditions. Water supplies
will also be improved, Mr.. Daniels
said, as It Is an easy matter for cess
pool liquids to drain through the
soil into wells which supply the
homes with drinking water.
The sewer system as outlined
should be adequate to care for the
residents of Metuchen for twenty
five years, the engineer said. al
though it may be necessary to pro-
vide additional filter beds.
G. H. Capen, another state health
board official, said he had exam
ined the plans of the proposed sewer
system and found them satisfactory.
The filter beds, he said, will not be
Objectionable in any way. He de-
MED that the system was merely an
experiment, declaring that it would
not have been approved by the
state health board unless it was ad-
eQuate.
Otto volker, borough engineer.
submitted a report showing what
streets would be cared for as well
as the estimated cost. The expen-
diture of $245,000 would be suffi-
Gent, according to his estimate, to
purchase the land. filter beds and
tanks necessary to this system to-
gether with all the pipe needed in
the fourteen mile system. This sum
would also cover legal and engineer
ing expenses. he said.
william Schultz, president of the
local Chamber of Commerce, who
has been instrumental in pushing
the sewer project, spoke briefly of
the need of the improvement. IT
one block in Metuchen, he said,
there are at the present time forty
cesspools. A delegation from South
Metuchen was anxious to learn the
name in which the improvement
would be paid for, whether by bond
issue, the money being assessed to
all in the general tax or by direct
assessment on the lands benefited.