New Britain herald., 1922-03-11

turers and in his rally speech at I,.h- uanian hall he threw down the gage
 of battle to Roraback and challenged | him with mntualty of interests, two l important md t-to-he-sneercd at enemies Mho would be pleased to see | him turned back at the primary l As usual, MT. Quigley is appealing
 direct to the people. He has not
 fully disclosed his method Of attack
 but as this is the time for preliminary
 skirmishing only, there is nothing sur-
 prising about that fact
 New Britain ice dealers are invited
 to give attention to a notice sent out
 recently by Rainvile ice company,
 which has informed the public that 1t
 will give its customers the benefits of
 reduced harvesting costs. A similar
 announcement by local ice companies
 would be most welcome.
 The Plainville company has been
 past winter by taking advantage of
 the labor surplus. For several pre- vious winters it has been difficult to
 secure labor at prices within reason.
 Ice men, therefore, found 1t necessary
 to increase the price of their product.
 Now that there have been reductions in harvesting costs smaller price is
 to be expected, especially in view of the fact that the storage houses are | filled to capacity.
 | It is unfortunate that the advocates
 of lower taxation, in their zeal, have
 seen fit to weaken the public organi-
 zaton in spots where it could least afford to be weakened. According to present forecasts. it may be necessary I to reduce the personnel of the police and fire departments by dismissing present members and to set at lower l figures the salaries of school teach CTS, thereby causing many of those
 now employed in the schools to seek other fields where the remuneration is
 commensurate with the skill and ef- fort necessary for qualified instruc- tors.
 ] New Britain should not be asked to get along with a smaller police or fire department. During the past few years competent police authorities
 have constantly urged the need of en-
 larging the force in order to keep pace with the growth of the city. New beats have been laid out so that bet ter protection was afforded. It is said that it may now be necessary to make a radical change in the beats detailing men who are retained on the force to cover larger areas and dropping some of the patrolmen entirely In order to abide by the spirit of the city meeting, it may be found necessary also to dismiss several members of the active fire department
 It is to be hoped that the officials of these departments will find some other way out of the dilemma, some other way to economize. It would be the height of injustice to dismiss mem bers of either the police or fire de- partments who have a right to expect that they will retain their posts dur ing good behavior. To drop them would be shabby treatment of which New Britain should not be guilty. Members of the school board have heard that Superintendent Holmes ildy ISolSil dIlu LHdL dDOuL SiAly teachers are determined not to renew their contracts at salary rate less than they are now receiving. The loss of MT. Holmes would be a serious blow to the continuance of the system now operative in the school depart ment. It would likewise be unkind treatment of conscientious official who has devoted sixteen years of his life to building up the New Britain schools.
 Despite opinions to the contrary, there still exists doubt whether the action of the city meeting in reducing |all appropriations will carry much weight. Salaries are fixed by ordi- nance. It certainly was never the in tention of the fathers of the city meeting idea to have that meeting board supersede the common council in legislative matters in which 1t is supreme. If it is possible for the city meeting board to alter decisions of the common council and the board of finance, why waste the time of those two branches of government by asking them to give study to appro- priations every year?