Year: 1878

Gentlemen Of the City Council:


First of all, in entering upon our respec-
tive duties, may we with reverent hearts pay
our tribute to the Great Watchman, who
with sleepless eye, both by night and by
day, during the past municipal year, hath
guarded and protected our good city, and
preserved it from devastating fires, from war
and pestilence, and from those civil commo-
tions which have disturbed the peace of other
cities OF our land; and may we humbly in
woke the some gracious aud benignant care
over it for the present and for the years to
come.


In my inaugural address of last year ex-
pressed the sanguine hope that the stress of
hard times would be over before the end of
the year. In this, with thousands of others,
have been disappointed. The dark clouds
which then overshadowed the business inter-
ests of the country have not yet lifted, but
rather have settled down more ominously
upon the financial horizon. Dizziness con-
tinues to brood over the face of things. In.
deed the worst features discernible in the sit
uation are the lethargy, the bewilderment of
business men. Nobody knows what to do
or how to act. The shrewdest and wisest
cannot tell what consequences may result
from taking backward steps, when we were
Just upon the point of reaching the goal of
the resumption of specie payment to which
our weary feet and wistful eyes have been
SO long directed. would not be prophet
of despondency. To our elastic people, a
revival of business activity and
return to prosperity will surely
come sooner or later. The country is
and failures, do not, like shipwrecks and
fires, annihilate wealth; they operate to re-
adjust titles-the property still remaining in
the community. The great majority of Con-
gress at least, profess to perceive behind the
overshadowing cloud a silver lining. The
passage by that honorable body of the late
important act in respect to the currency may in
itself tend to give relief, by ending the long
uncertainty. Its opposers seem to be united
in the opinion that if the project deemed by
them so impolitic must pass into law, it
was well that it was done quickly;- that it
was better to plunge into the tide boldly than
to stand shivering on the brink. Perhaps in
the end thepressure of hard times by way
OF discipline. warning and reproof, will be
profitable. One lesson will sooner or later
be learned, that the dollar, whether of gold,
or silver, or paper, cannot honestly be ac-
quired without work, or retained without
prudence and frugality. But in view of the





the wheels of industry, the distrusr in all
channels of business, especially in view of
the great monetary revolution threatened or
going on, the pending revision of the tariff,
most complicated and difficult subject, and
the proposed legislation looking toward the
extinguishment of the national banks, he
weuld be bold man who should predict
anything like recovery or restoration of
business prosperity during the present
municipal year.


We ought. therefore, in the administration
of the business concerns of the city to look
the situation full in the face. 1t is to be a
hard year. Municipalities as well as indi.
viduals are called upon to exercise self-denial,
and conduct their affairs very closely. We
have one favorable circumstance to encourage
us. Although the long continued commercial
and industrial depression has made and is
making itself felt here as elsewhere. yet Port
land thus far has borne up nobly, increasing
even her valuation of real estate, and keep
ing down her taxes to the old rates. For this
reason she will be in situation to take ad-
vantage of the first revival of business. It
becomes cur highest duty then to adhere to
the policy of retrenchment inaugurated the
last municipal year with even more strictness
than ever, SO that when the eye shall catch
the first faint dawn of better times, nothing
IN the condition of our municipal affairs,
caused by extravaganza or mismanagement,
or unnecessary burden of taxation, shall re.
tard the coming in of the full day of renewed
prosperity and business activity.


The result of last years policy above al
luded to is encouraging. A years trial has
proved that it is not visionary, but eminently
practical. The course of action pursued has
seemed, no doubt, to the class actuated by
ne ;pfo &c he
good, not joyous but grievous; to the great
mass of our citizens, however, am per-
suaded it has worked out the peaceable fruits
of righteousness. Indeed with the constitu.
tional limitation. whereby we cannot increase
our permanent debt, on the one side, and the
rate of taxation, to increase which would dis
tress the poor, embarrass the rich, and check
the growth of the city, on the other, we have
but one straight and narrow pathway before
us in which to tread; else we are likely to
land where many Of our sister cities have al
ready landed.


will proceed to call to your notice as
briefly as can some of the principal sub
jects which will be likely to require your at
tention during the year. The most important
of these to which the thoughtful citizen and
taxpayer first turns is


THE FINANCES OF THE CITY,
and am glad to be able to give a cheerful
report in regard to their condition as COM
pared with former years. Our fiscal year
ends March 81, 1878. At that date, without
increasing the rate of taxation, we shall
have paid up all current expenses and &C.
crued liabilities for the year, including
$l50,000 railroad interest, $ll,300 for re-
building Fore street wall, and made up de-
felt in income from the previous year of
$1,000, in all, $l69. 200, and we shall have
put into the sinking fund the handsome sum
of $4,000. thereby decreasing the net debt
of the city by that amount. The sum of
$62,53S.01 has already at this date accrued
to the sinking fund, to which will be added
under the ordinance at the end of the year
the surplus of cash income, and the balances
of unexpended appropriations, which will
raise the fund, in the opinion of our excellent
treasurer, to above the $4,000.


Besides, the gross debt of the city has been
reduced $375,S00 by the payment, from the
accumulauons of the sinking fund, of that
amount of municipal bonds which matured
during the year, and by the payment by
the commissioners of $l63,000 of the Build
ing Loan bonds, which also matured during
the year, the reby diminishing the gross debt
in all $53S,S00.


These payments do not affect the net debt
of the city, inasmuch as they were made out
of what has usually been counted available
resources. But it is very satisfactory to have
so large an amount of the outstanding liabil-
tiles of the city out of the way, and 80 far
as the $S75,S00 of municipal bonds are con-
cerned, the interest thereon ceases at maturi-
ty. and no longer goes into the amount
to be raised by taxation.


The details of the foregoing summary can
be better understood by considering first the
gross and then the net indebtedness of the
city.


GROSS CITY DEBT AT THE END OF THE LAST FIs-


CAL YEAR, MARCH 81, 1877.
Total municipal debt including bonds


issued to the Atlantic and st. Law


renee railroad company, in municipal


form, $2,9S2, 200
Building loan bonds, 56s,OOO
Bonds issued in aid of Portland and


Rochester railroad, 1,l50,000
Bonds issued in aid of Portland and


Ogdensburg railroad, 1,35o,000



Total, $6,050,2OO
OF the above municipal bonds


there have matured and have


been paid as above, s375,sOo
There has been paid and can


celled of the building loan


bonds as above the sum of 1890
Showing a reduction of gross


debt during the year of $53s,S00
And leaving balance of such