$1,800,000.00 Bond Issue for Roads
Page 97
$1,800,000 BOND ISSUE FOR ROADS
The County Board at a special meeting Wednesday morning, July 9, 1916, confirmed a bond issue of $1,800,000 for the construction of hard roads, either of gravel, rock or macadam, throughout the county.
A resolution for the repairing of the roads, some fifty in number, was passed by the board on October 2, 1914, and the bond issue was later authorized by the vote of the people.
The roads affected include the Niles Road, the Gross Point Road, Telegraph Road, Milwaukee Avenue Road, River Road, Dundee and Wheeling Road, Timber Road, Schoolhouse Road, Fork Road, Arlington Heights Road and the Rand Road.
Candidate for State Auditor
A short time ago Homer J. Tice was asked to define the predominating influences which brought about advanced road legislation of the 48th General Assembly of Illinois. It was a large undertaking to enumerate and discuss all the causes and influences which brought about the agitation for better roads in the State and which resulted in the enacting of our present road laws. The work has been largely a matter of investigation and education. We, of this State, have been content for generations to go along and accommodate ourselves to existing conditions without stopping to count the cost and in fact without any knowledge of the enormous sums of money and the very small benefits and permanent results obtained. Our roads, like many other public institutions, have suffered because “What is everybody's business is nobody's business.” They are something like Topsy, "they just growed” without thought, without systematic plan, or definite future purpose. So long as our natural resources brought abundant returns and so long as business interest prospered no more thought or energy was given to conservation than absolute necessity required, but as our funds in nature's bank began to run low; as competition pressed closer and closer; as demands grew greater, and as the balance sheet at the close of the year's business showed a continued decrease in tangible results, business men of all classes began to realize that a change in method or system was imperative. Hence the agitation for the conservation of natural resources; consolidation and co-operation; a lessening of operating expenses, and especially in agricultural an earnest effort to bring back the fertility of the soil and to increase its products by more systematic cultivation. To accomplish this desired result required investigation, experimenting and study. Among other things it was found that lack of system meant waste and that waste meant loss. That method meant saving and that saving meant, in many instances, more profit than actual gain in routine business transactions. That final results were obtained not only through specializing along one principal line but
Page 98
Page 99
in the systematic development of all correlating lines. Together with every other business enterprise, whether public or private, the X-ray was turned on the public road systems of our state. And when we came to look on the inside, we found that we were expending upon them every year more than seven millions of dollars and that the amount was growing larger each year and that this increasing amount was being applied upon the same mileage year in and year out. The expenditures never stopped, but the per cent of efficiency of the roads practically stood still.
Another discovery was that the farmer was paying for the delivery of the products of the farm more than double the amount which his competitors in the market of the world were paying for a like service. Or that in other counties or states having permanent roads the cost of hauling is less than one-half as much as in Illinois. Both the producer and consumer learned from this information that the Illinois farmer or producer was getting less for his products and the consumer was paying more, whilst in localities having permanent roads was getting more and the consumer was paying less.
Another realization came at the less money the farmer has the less he buys of the merchant and manufacturer and the smaller his bank account. Hence the interest of the city in permanent road improvement and their willingness to pay the greater part of the building them. In other words, the business interests of the State are taking hold of the public roads in a business manner. In my judgment the real, though perhaps not the most prominent influence which made it possible to secure advanced road legislation in the 48th General Assembly, was what well may be termed co-operation of all business interests in both rural and urban districts.
Because of the condition of public roads of Illinois it will cost the farmers of the State 18 cents per ton per mile for an average haul of five miles, which is two and fifteen-hundredths cents per bushel for hauling the surplus corn, wheat and oats of the 1915 market. This cost will be in the aggregate $5,921,765, double the cost of a like service in countries and states having their main lines of travel permanently improved. This is an over cost or loss of 20 ¼ cents per acre on the corn ground, 23 ¾ cents on the wheat ground and 14 1/4 cents oats ground.
Permanently improved roads increase the value of land from $9.00 to $12.00 per acre. Such roads will cost the agriculturist, to pay his proportionate share, $l.86 per acre. We have in Illinois 32,522,880 acres of actual farm lands, or 50,817 sections. To permanently improve 20 per cent of the highways of the State will place within the one mile zone 24,320,000 acres, or 38,000 sections.
Road conditions affect the business of the banker, merchant, manufacturer, craftsman, the professional man and all other occupations. Improved roads make better schools and larger attendance in rural communities. The same with attendance on church service.
The churches and schools of a community are its greatest moral, educational and social forces. No state or nation ever has or ever will attain the greatest greatness or achieve permanency unless the foundation stones of the structure be the church and the school. Education is the pathfinder and pilot for civilization. The standard of civilization is measured by the degree of educated Christian citizenship. If the schools are to have a maximum efficiency in training and instruction, the children must be afforded facilities for reaching the schools. To do this the road from the home to the school house door must be one that can be traveled every day of the year.
There are 30,000,000 children of school age in the United States, 18,000,000 of whom reside in rural communities. The ratio of illiteracy in rural communities having indifferently improved roads is 18 to 1, compared with communities having permanently improved roads. There is double the percentage of illiteracy found in rural communities of the United States as compared with cities. Along with non-attendance in the schools goes illiteracy, narrow and selfish thought, weak and unstable patriotism and retarded civilization.
The last Federal Census shows a decrease in population in communities whose roads are unimproved and a heavy increase in localities having improved roads.
The bettering of home and community life, the educating and elevating of our citizens, the prosperity and advancement of our State all depend in large degree upon the public roads — the means of communication and transportation.
Whatever builds up and sustains a community or state and brings to it broader and superior advantages, greater and more diversified pleasures creates a love and respect for its institutions and inspires patriotic thought and sustaining purpose.
If our purpose be, and I know it is, the elevating of our citizenship to an ever higher and higher plain and the continual advancement of our people morally and intellectually and through these agencies the establishing of a permanency which will be a sure defense for all time and if our National Ideal be the strength of justice, the charity of power and the friendship of human brotherhood we must educate and train the mind of the child and through the child the heart and soul and conscience of the man.
Page 100
Page 101
George H. Klehm, George Landeck and Joseph Hoss, committee, caused letters to be sent to the mayors and village presidents of very town in Cook County inviting them as representatives and delegates to accompany them to Springfield to work for the amendment of the Tice Law. There was an especially large delegation from Niles Township. They were successful in securing what they went after. Previous to this the appropriation set aside had been spent on roads between unincorporated territory. They purposely skipped villages. These gentlemen deserve recognition for having the Tice Law amended, thereby having a hard road continue through villages and cities.
George E. Brannan, Attorney for Niles Township, has been active, for the township of Niles, most especially for quick action in the Sanitary District Department of this locality.
He has been instrumental in getting the Sanitary District of Chicago to build a plant at Morton Grove worth $15,000.00. The same is located on Dempster Street and the River at Scott Bridge, Morton Grove, and is called the Sedimentation Plant.
Work has also been started on the outfall sewer which will cost $35,000.00, and located on Oakton Street at the east line of the village.
The County Court has confirmed a special assessment for the construction of a sewer, for practically all of the streets of Niles Center, to cost approximately $40,000.00.
Republican Candidate for Governor of Illinois
The two systems will connect up and make a complete connection with the North Shore channel. Mr. Brannan is well known for his persistency, and usually accomplishes his purpose. His work with the township authorities has been for the benefit, welfare and success in the improvement of this district.
Page 102
Page 103
Mr. Ernst Buehler, Asst: State's Atty., well-known among the Germans of Cook County, and active in their organizations for over a period of two years, has been in the County Law Department, the branch of the State's Attorney office which handles the County’s legal business.
In this capacity he advises the various town and village officials, Such as its presidents, school directors, and school boards, and highway commissioners. He is, therefore, well known among the various village and town officials of Cook County.
It was a part of Mr. Buehler's official duties in this office, to prepare the contracts for the Scott and Burg bridges, on behalf of both the Board of Cook County and the Niles Township Highway Commissioners.
Mr. Buehler’s experience in the services of Cook County, in this connection, has proven that he is specially qualified for this kind of work. It is just as necessary to have the contract for the building of these bridges properly and carefully prepared by an expert in his line, as it is that the engineering work, etc., is efficiently executed.