The Waterbury Democrat., 1939-03-06

Not merely cities of large popula. tion, but towns whose population i. less than 10000 have successfully adopted the city manager charter form of government, proponents ot the plan explain and point out al some length in this the eighth in a series expounding the genera merits of the plan which is pro- posed for Waterbury.
 ARTICLE VIII
 The Manager Plan is Remak-
 ing Local Government Little
 Cities and the Manager
 Plan
 The larger cities by no means have a monopoly on successful manager plan government. Four hundred and thirty-three cities with population of less than 50,- 900 have the manager plan. Two and six-tenths percent of the communities of 1000 to 2,500 that may legally adopt the manager charter have done so, 8.5 percent of cities of 2,500 to 10000 have the plan, 19.7 percent of cities 10000 to 25,000 are manager cities, and 27.3 percent of cities of 25,O00 to 50,000 adopted the manager form.
 These percentages, do not in- clude the many cities operating under council-manager ordinan- ces which may be rescinded by a new council without any refer ence to the peoples wishes. In certain states such an ordinance amounts only to a gentleman's agreement, for the elected officials have a legal right to challenge the managers administrative au- thority at any time.
 Some of the savings and econ- omies in the smaller cities which have the plan are so startling, and the plan has proved to work so well over so many years, that in most cities a return to the old political methods is unthinkable.
 Here are some stories about small cities using the council manager plan.
 Fort Atkinson, Wis (5,793): This little city in the prosperous dairy ing region of southern Wisconsin recently was forced to vote for or against abandoning its mana ger form of government.
 During the seven manager years the tax rate for municipal pur- poses averaged more than 30 per- cent less than during the preced- ing seven years. A debt retire. ment program is expected to put the city on pay-as-you-go basis by 1941. Fire, police and many other services have been inn proved. Businesslike budget, tax record, audit and monthly expen- ditures report systems have beer installed. There have been many sensible economies, such as hir- ing 8 city engineer by the hour only when there was a job for him to do instead of keeping him full time on $3000 salary.
 The community voted three to two to keep manager government, which carried every ward.
 Hackensack, N. J. (24,568): In the old days, banks sometimes were on the verge of taking over defaulting Sities, Hackensack sharply revised this tradition two years ago when, under city manager auspices, it took over a bank building and made it into a magnificent city hall. The bank had built the edifice at cost of $25O O00, but the city bought it, furnished, from the bankrupt title company for the sum of $89,000 in cash.
 Prior to 1883, when the city manager form of government took effect, Hackensack bonds had been offered at 58 with no takers. Now, after five years of the new regime, the city is not only on cash basis, but it has achieved this without hoisting the tax rate. The city has at the same time gained greatiysain public works. Foremost among these, because of its great importance to a com- muting city such as Hackensack, is the recently built municipal bus station, second of its kind in the country. Seven hundred bus es use the terminal daily, and bring the community only 35 minutes by bus from Times Square in New York City.
 Fl Dorado, Kan. (10,0OO): Des- pite the completion of many 1887 improvements, including storm sewer projects, Identification of parks, and a filtration and water softening plant which will save consumers $12.000 to $l5.000 per year in soap, Fl Dorado ari- nounced 8 reduction of taxes in : 1888, with promise of further re- auctions in 1889. Fl Dorado has had the manager plan for P years.
 East Cleveland, Ohio (4O,O0O): Once again, according to its latest annual report, copies of which