The Morning Astorian

RAISING MUNICIPAL REVENUE

The charter commission now in session for the purpose of supplying the urgent reforms needed in Astoria's municipal code, have done one wise thing in the matter of amending the revenue-raising section so as to dispense with the absolute necessity, and reliance, of, and upon, the fines and forfeitures from the disorderly elements, for the sum of the city's expenditures. The commission proposes to raise the limit of city taxation from 1 per cent, to 2 per cent, thereby giving the local treasury sufficient money to meet the current obligations of the city without having sole recourse to the penal moneys collected in the police court. This is not only wise in an administrative sense, but is, morally, a far better and cleaner process. Besides it is of a firmer and more reliable basis and will not fluctuate from month to month. It takes just so much money to run a city of this size, and the 1 per cent now fixed by charter is inadequate to meet the normal demands of local government, and the 2 per cent tax will just comfortably cover the annual budget. The advanced property tax will have the effect of leaving the city very much freer in the regulation of the vicious phases of society here and render Astoria less amenable to the wide-spread reproach that now oppresses her. It is inevitable that the questionable classes should seek to override laws and ordinances when they realize that the very sinews of control are furnished by them and their flagrant operations.