Page images
PDF
EPUB
[graphic]

of cheap land in Western Canada there occurred a tremendous migration of homesteaders. As the hitherto unknown, or at least unappreciated, possibilities of the new country were realized, the small stream of immigrants became a flood. But they were not drawn into the northwest by gold, as were the forty-niners of California, but by wheat. It will be interesting to compare the development of the west and the northwest, and to see whether or not history will repeat itself in the way in which the two localities have handled the problems incident to their growth.

The picturesque features of the Wild West, the wide open frontier towns, the gambling resorts and the shooting scrapes, which Bret Harte has handed down and preserved in American literature, are lacking in the northwest. Unquestionably the fact that a different class of men are drawn into gold camps, is largely responsible for this. Another reason is that a body of eight hundred effi

PANORAMIC VIEW OF

cient men-the Royal Northwest Mounted Police-keep a tract of land larger than Europe in as peaceful, law abiding a condition as one would today find in a quiet little Ohio village.

As a striking result cities springing full grown in a season on the rich plains swing into the advanced line of municipal government with municipally owned street car lines, water works, telephone systems and electric lighting plants. Single tax is being tried, and with success, in more than one community. To an observer fresh from the decade-old wrangles in cities of the states over the untried problem of city ownership, the way in which the Canadian towns rush into things is amazing. These people actually seem not to care to raise political issues. They carelessly begin undertakings in a day that would furnish material for a hundred campaigns and secure untold numbers of fat offices in American cities.

These new ideas are being made ap

[graphic][merged small]
[graphic][merged small]

plicable, in a sense, to the larger governments also. While the Dominion government is helping to build railways, the provinces are churning the butter for the farmer and marketing his eggs for him. Eighteen creameries operated by the Alberta provincial government, in one year manufactured one and one-half million pounds of butter and marketed it at twenty cents a pound. There are as many creameries operated as private enterprises as there are government creameries, but their total product is not so large.

The provincial government establishes refrigerators or warehouses for storing the butter, and holds it under insurance without expense to the farmer until there is a market demand. The chief ware

house is in Calgary, but there are branches in other towns. The provincial government superintends the work; sees that the buildings are properly constructed, and supplies the administration for the enterprise. It educates butterIt educates butter

makers, and gives their services gratis to the creameries. It sees that there is a sufficient supply of pure water and suitable drainage. The government stamp, which is a guarantee of purity and sanitation, goes on every pound of butter manufactured.

The operation of the provincial creameries has been remarkably successful, because of the quality of the butter offered for sale. Better prices are received for it and a surer market provided than would be possible through individual enterprise. It is the belief of the dairy commissioners that as great or greater progress will be made in the building of creameries during the next few years than has been made during the last five years, when the number has trebled. One of the great advantages to the farmers is in the educational features of the government plan.

The popular demand for municipal ownership of public utilities is universal through the new northwest. As these

[graphic][merged small]

towns' grow and face the conditions of the future, the attention of the world will be upon them.

Fort William and Port Arthur are adjoining cities. In fact the two are practically one. In this double city the people operate and own the water, electric light, telephone and street car systems." Port Arthur has owned its street car system for fourteen years and during the last few years has paid all operating expenses, one-half the city taxes, and has laid away a certain amount for a sinking fund, all of which the profit arising from the street car system has enabled them to do.

Meanwhile, their citizens use their present energies in a healthy rivalry and in devotion to their municipal ownership experiment. Every stranger who comes into Port Arthur has to make acquaintance with the town's manner and method of doing business before anything else is done. If he comes to talk about wheat he must hear first how the city telephones are run. Every citizen of Port Arthur carries about with him the last quarterly statement of the railway and light commission. He knows how much profit there was in the operation of the waterworks and the telephone system. Inci

dentally he will explain that Fort William is helping to pay the taxes due on Port Arthur real estate. When a Fort William citizen pays five cents to the street car conductor he contributes a mite to every individual taxpayer in the rival

town.

Although the street railroad charges a five-cent fare, the telephone service is much less than the old rates charged by a private company. The old company used to charge thirty-six dollars a year for a business telephone, unlimited service, which is now supplied for twentyfour dollars, and a residence telephone costs only twelve dollars a year.

Port Arthur is the only town on the American continent which owns and operates all of its utilities. The most conspicuous citizen of the town is a member of the railway and light commission. The membership of the commission is restricted to three, and one is elected each year. It is a greater honor to be a member of the commission than it is to be mayor or alderman. The citizen who has been honored by his municipality as a member of the board must serve without pay. He is not allowed to issue a pass for a ride on any of the lines, not even to a member of his own family.

[graphic][merged small]
[graphic][merged small]

The falls of the Currant River are almost in the city itself and all the power necessary for use either in manufacturing or for the purpose of electric operations of any kind is supplied by this. convenient stream. The city has appropriated everything and the manufacturer must do business with it. Yet the controlling Yet the controlling officials, serving without pay, save all of the salaries which go to eat up so much of the profits of public utilities elsewhere, and because of these and other reasons, one would hardly be justified in pointing to this town of 10,000 people as proof positive that municipal ownership is justifiable in American cities.

The total investment by the municipality was only $150,000, and last year the net income was $36,000. Of course it would be impossible to continue these proportional figures if the city should grow to a larger population, and of course it would be impossible for a city where millions were involved to have the officials devote their time exclusively to enterprises, without compensation. But Port Arthur's mayor, after briefly reviewing the recent reports of the various systems, said: "I confidently expect to see the day when the property owners of this town will walk up to the auditor's office and each receive a check as his proportional share of the profits from the

operation of our utilities, after his taxes are paid."

The province of Manitoba has adopted. the idea of municipal telephone service, thereby, in view of the experience of the Canadian towns that have tried it, insuring cheaper rates and a more efficient service. The government will build at least a thousand miles of long distance lines reaching from Winnipeg to Portage, Brandon and intermediate points, northwest by way of Neepawa and southwest to points in Southern Manitoba. In Moose Jaw municipal ownership is an established principle, the city owning its own water, sewage, and electric lighting plants. Whether or not the town regards its experiment as successful may be determined from the fact that Moose Jaw has spent over $850,000 on public works and buildings. Prince Albert has enlarged her municipal electric lighting plant and has constructed one costing $75,000, and in addition water and sewer systems costing $150,000.

In Edmonton, which has outgrown its old telephone system, the city, encouraged by the success of the smaller system, is replacing it with a much larger one.

It may be incidentally mentioned in this connection that Edmonton has the single tax system which has been found to accomplish the two very satisfactory

results of promoting improvements on the land, and of discouraging the practice of buying land as a speculation and letting it be idle in anticipation of a rise in value. Edmonton did not adopt the single tax because its people were believers in the theories of Henry George, but to head off a "boom" that threatened when the municipal charter was granted. Some of the first comers knew the havoc that a boom would work to the new town, and they set about restraining and discouraging the land speculators. It was reasoned that to tax unimproved town lots at the same rate charged against improved property would to some degree compel land owners to build. That was what Edmonton needed-houses for the people who were coming in. So it is today that if one plot on the main street of the town occupied by a bank building is valued at $16,000, the vacant piece of property next door is assessed at the same figure.

Edmonton has added a modification of its own to this taxation system. Technically they do not have a single tax; there is a second tax on "business" on the basis of the floor space occupied. The scheme of taxing business according to floor space occupied grew out of a desire to reach financial institutions and the incomes of professional men. The rates are: Banks and other financial institutions may be taxed to the extent of $10.00 per square foot occupied. Mercantile houses may not be taxed more than $5.00 per square foot. Last year, banks, trust companies, and brokers' offices were assessed at $7.50 a square foot; jewelers were assessed at not more than $5.00, and the rates ranged from that figure down to fifty cents a square foot for warehouses. Offices occupied by lawyers, physicians, and real estate agents were carefully valued and assessed. If a physician had his office in his residence, the room he used in which to receive patients was taken as a basis for his tax bill.

In Manitoba the McDonald administration came into power on the municipal

ownership issue. As a rule the various municipalities own their street car lines, but find it advantageous to lease them to syndicates of private capitalists who give reduced fares to the people and also pay good returns or rents for their leases.

Perhaps the fact that the common good seems to be the primary aim, and that personal and political advantage apparently does not enter into calculation, is the reason that municipal ownership and governmental supervision is successful in these municipalities.

The American reader who follows this tale of how Canadian cities handle their public utilities, must carefully weigh the different conditions, before he rushes to the conclusion that what is good here would be equally good at home. Here many men who are busy with big problems of planting a civilization, where a short time ago the unbroken prairie swept uninhabited for hundreds of miles, willingly give up their time to handle. civic problems of lighting and transportation. Therefore one is not at all surprised to learn that graft in office in these towns is almost unknown.

The time-honored custom of granting valuable franchises for street car lines, for water works and electric lighting privileges to private syndicates-humorously enough dubbed public service corporations-is not meeting with any favor in the Canadian West. The graft and the lobbying which is connected in innumerable instances with the granting of franchises in America, is singularly lacking in this new country of the north. The passive indifference which characterizes the attitude in which the towns and cities south of the line treat such vital questions is also entirely absent. The capitalists from the United States who regard Western Canada as an especially inviting field in which to grab franchises, will meet with a reception which will confirm their belief in the old myth which we all learned in the geographies of our childhood-that Canada is a cold and barren country-which is a myth, indeed, in every sense but this.

« PreviousContinue »