New Britain herald., 1924-03-11
OPPOSE FARE RAISE
 AT ?. U. |. HEARING
(Continued from First I'age)

test and with sufficient vehemence ana that as matter of course the commission will heed the request and that the company must submit.
 But the utility has rights. firmly intrenched in the constitutions of the united States and of this state and in
 declsions of the supreme courts of the
 lnltcd States and of this state. Fur 'thermore, these rights have been rec
 cSnl|ed and established in a very large number of decisions by the commissions of the several states.
 Tn view of this general misunder- standing, though of course the com- mission is well aware of the true situation. it may not be an1iss to give this subject brief consideration.
 "A public utility has d constitution al right to fair and reasonable re- turn upon the present value of the property useful and used in public service.''
 Mir. Watrous quoted numerous legal authorities in support of this rule and from a number of decisions.
 We do not propose to spend much time in discussing questions of values or returns. We have the figures ten tatively accepted by this commission in its report to the general assembly of 1921. The lowest of these was about sa2,00o,oo0 and tho highest. based on the figures of 1919, about s9S, 900, 900. Valuation as of the present day would, we believe, greatly exceed the higher figure.
 The net income for 1923 would not begin to yield fair return upon even the lowest of these figures. even were there no allowance for annual Appreciation, which is usually, per- haps. universally made.
 "l have discussed the principles which in our opinion should, and which we believe will. detc / line the | decision of these cases.
 With the same number of riders ss in 1923. and with token fare of | 1-S cents we will still fall far short | of the return to which we are con additionally entitled"
 President Storrs' Statement
 President Lucius S. Storrs of the Connecticut Co. then read statement which was in part as follows:
 Since 1917 we have been before | times. due 10 necessity for increasing our rates of fare. In each case evil dence was presented showing that the Increased rates were necessitated hy continued increases in the cost of la bor and materials necessary in the op- eration and maintenance of the pro rerty. The new rates in each case were adjudged by your commission to be reasonable under the conditions prevailing.
 The rates esta blished by the com pany and approved by the commission with tho test rates establish cd upon order of the commission has ( given us experience with a. very con variety of fare systems and the records therefore, will provide all or the testimony required 10 show { that none of the various rates were A in producing sufficient rev C enue to meet the cost of the service I during the period of advancing prices a Tt was not until the rate of ten f cents had been established that it was Il nton approximately possible to bal. n ance the budget of operating costs. In The necessity for constant devel- opment of the plant by the addition 'f cars and other equipment, increase n power house capacity and better nent of rail facilities during the war period Cat time when the financial 'csults of it's operation precluded the Of obtaining any new mon. y through the regular channelsb re- luired the use of all available funds or capital expenditures"
 Accounting the various amounts