Paragould soliphone. (Paragould, Ark.) 1918-1950, 1922-01-27

state. Iney can TdlSe revenue anu
they can spend il.
although the legislature OF 1919,
by the passage Of the large number
of special road improvement district
bills, took from the county courts
great deal of their legitimate control
over roads / want to say to you
that under the good old constitution
of 1874 they cannot take away from
you all jurisdiction over roads and
bridges. There comes a time i'll the.
administration of any Of the road
improvement district affairs that the
county court must be consulted and
beg YOU to examine all road prof.
ects with the utmost care and eau
ton, with the view to prevent graft
and the waste of public money. Ap-
prove nothing that is not just and
honest. Many districts were or
ganized that ought not to have been
organized; much public money has
been wasted on roads poorly CON
structed Many special acts Gre
ating districts have been repealed.
Some honest commissioners have re
fused to issue bonds and construct
roads that were authorized. some
county courts have stopped other
projects. Whether the work be on
roads where work has already com
menced, or on new work exercise
all the power which you have
over roads in the interest of the
people who pay the taxes. See that
the districts get the value of their
money on each project.
Would Change District Plan.
81 believe that the burden of road
building should not be entirely upon
the home owners and so | have not
favored the Improvement district
plan. I would like to see such a
change in our constitution and laws
as would make all the property
of the state contribute to a system
of state highways and all the prop
erty of each county contribute to
secondary system of county high
ways and then leave the local COM
munities to work out for themselves
local roads, for the construction of
which all the property in these dis
tricts should be taxed | believe
those who use the roads should
contribute the larger part Of the
funds for construction and main
tenance / favored before the legis-
lature and before the people the
proposition to leave the larger part
of the automobile license tax in the
counties to be spent by the county
courts. l believe that the 70 per
cent of the tax left with the coun
ties this year win aggregate nearly
as much as the whole of the tax for
last year. Upon my recommends
ton the General Assembly at the
time it divided the tax also in
creased the license tax.
Il advocated before the people
and urged upon the General AS
sembly a gasoline tax and had pre-
pared a bin for it's collection which
would have yielded more tax than
we now get. 1t authorized the col
lection of this tax by the oil in
spection bureau, which was then
and is still in existence. This bill
was not accepted by the senate but
another was passed instead, with
which I am sure you are familiar.
feel that this is defective in some
respects and has not been enforced
as it should have been. We Will
lose annually from $50,U0o to $50
600 Of revenue that should have
come to the counties ana state on
account Of the gasoline tax. Ac-
cording to the estimates based upon
the inspection tax the state or coun-
ty should have received about $780,
600 from this tax. one-half to the
counties and oue-half to the state
As now administered we will per
haps not receive over $250,000. but
this is some help. with the license
tax and the gasoline tax each coun-
ty in the state has had its local
fund increased. 7 advocated these
measures because / believed and still
believe that the counties need the
tax and that the county courts and
local authorities can get better re-
suits from this money than to have
it expended as heretofore, by the
highway department.
Under the old plan some coun-
ties get a great deal more than they
put in. Some counties get great
deal less than they pay and some
counties get nothing. The county
courts ana county judges are ON
trial as to these funds and l expect
that they will make such a show
ing that the next legislature will
justify the continuation of this di-
vision in favor Of the counties and
perhaps an increase of such taxes
believe that in these road and
other local matters that the nearer
you get the administration of the af-
fairs to the people, the better for all
concerned Taxpayers like to know