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ILIIHEIE RIE iil \ Af) SECOND SECTION : Page 9 Oakville- Trafalgar Journal Member Canadian Weekly Newspapers Association published Every Thursday Morning In Oakville, Ont, by Oakville-Trafalgar Publishers, Ltd. 7 DUNN STREET NORTH s. Casey Wood, Jr. Managing Editor Bill Cotton, Editorial PHONE 1298 Vincent H. Barrey Advertising Manager Assistant Thursday, September 6th, 1951 fqualized Assessment A river of newsprint has been set and printed concerning the question of equalized assessment. It is not our plan to add much to this spate, but to dis- cuss the matter at all requires a lot of words. So this will only try and skim the high spots. Principally, it is difficult for most people to understand why a bus- iness property in say Acton should be assessed at $40 per foot, while the same type of establishment in Oakville will be assessed at $80 per foot. This is on the county equalized assessment basis. When the equalized assessment idea was intro- duced. it was set up so that properties in Toronto, cornwall, Oakville, Acton and Windsor, would all Dear their proportionate share of taxation. There were factors placed in the equation which when applied would raise or lower the assessment in proportion to accessibility to earning power, or re-sale value of the property. These factors applied by the various as8esS- ors of the different communities should result in each sharing in the over-all costs on an equitable basis. There is nothing much the matter with the theory. And we believe that all the assessors, equally qualified, have applied the yardstick set up for them in an accurate manner. But the result has been that growing towns in counties, as in the case of Burling- ton and Oakville, end up by apparently bearing a sud- denly higher percentage of the total cost than should be the case. But Oakville's assessment for a business enter- prise would naturally have to be higher than would the assessment for the same type, and even size, of s in Acton. Oakville is larger, has a larger --area to draw on. It is more easily reached by f-town people who spend money when here, and 1 the direct tourist route: It would not be fair 'to bring Oakville assessments down to Acton's, and thus th an 'equal share of cost on merchants who could not possibly secure an equal amount of business and resulting profit with which to pay the taxes. It would be equally unfair to bring the Acton business up in as tent to that of Oakville, as the same result would he achieved. Equalized assessment means, in other words, equalized ability to pay. In the case of a homeowner, the re-sale value of the property, and the advantages and services which are available, are the same considerations as the amount of business in the case of a merchant. The 'method of having each town or township make its own assessment on this equalized basis, then send their assessments to the county office be- forre the notices are sent out, means that the co-or- dinaing officer, the county assessor, has an oppor- tunity to revise or otherwise improve the job of the local assessor if this appears necessary. The totals which we carried last week, and which were passed in by-law form by the county council, were arrived at in this way. Of course, as with individual assessments, there will be a court of revision held, in which both Burling- ton and Oakyille may mhke an appeal. It would seem wise that in the event that Oakville does not consider its figure to be fair, that it appeal and have the mat- ter settled by an independent authority. However, as the total is the total of local assessments there would seem little room for argument, provided local assess: ing has been carried out correctly. This we believe has been done, for this town has a well qualified head for its department. By and large the theory of equalized assessment is a sound one, and enables purchasers of property, judging their properties by the assessment, to have a comparison with where they were formerly located, which they did not have before. The largest single factor for raised assessments each year under the equalized plan, for towns like Oakville and Burlington, most likely is that these communities fifteen years from now will be possibly cities . . . while Acton may not have grown very much, if at all. Oakville's growth in the past five years has heen amazing, and her growth in paying her way is now, apparently, going to be larger also. The per- centage which these two centres will bear of the total county assessment in fifteen years may well reach almost 80 percent between them. But the increased prosperity of each will, in large part, be the off-setting compensation . . . if there is any compensation for paying taxes. IT SEEMS T0 ME BY P. W. THOMPSON "Greatest show on earth," is the phrase sometimes used to de- cribe the Canadian National Ex- now in full swing once It is not an inept descrip- although sometimes ambi- tious. But what is actually the greatest show on earth? In a sense it is the great world itself, and the varied life that teems upon its surface. In this world of ours there is no lack of things to delight the senses and fascinate the mind. The physical iti of the JUST FISHIN 7 ay rem m-- Se ---- If you really want to find out how hard it is to do things which seem so easy when the other fel- low is doing them, just get your- self a job in a weekly newspaper plant and wait patiently for the holiday season to roll around. Because, when it comes to learn- ing mew tricks, even an old dog like me can manage, come vaca- tion time. Thank Gosh! Journal holidays, I'm happy to report, are just about over. But while they lasted, Jacks of all trades came a dime a half-dozen hereabouts. : For my part, I found out that, if you don't know how, more words run right off the side of the paper than stay on when you're laying out ads: After walking and phon- ing myself almost indigo in the face I found out why Phil Thomp- son takes so long to assemble the church news. After several. efforts to locate a customers account in the ledger, I gave up trying to fig- ure out how our Miss Martin and the auditor ever manage to bal- ance those books. And when I settled down to putting my rudi- mentary knowledge of make-up to better usé by working faster while we were short-handed, I discovered I had three extra thumbs I hadn't known about before. x Round and Round THe whole business had me run. ning around in such ever-widening circles that now I feel as though I could use another holi- day myself. All in all, I began to be caught up in something like the confusion that smothered me 'Wood would saw. Now, PUFFS FROM THE COTTON GIN when I first read about that rare He was no relation to the editor of the Journal, but he was every bit as ornery. One Track Mind Esau Wood, you see, Was a man who liked to saw wood, and all the wood Esau Wood saw Esau usually 'Wood would saw wood with a wood. saw that would saw wood, but one day Wood's wood saw would saw no wood and therefore the Wood Wood sawed was not the good wood Wood would saw if Wood's wood saw would saw wood. So Esau sought a saw that would saw wood. Finally, one day Esau saw a saw saw wood as no other wood saw Wood ever saw would saw. In fact, of all the saws Wood saw saw wood, Wood never saw a saw that would saw wood as the wood saw 'Wood saw would saw. So, what the heck, he bought it! Not For Me Baffling, isn't it? But the holl- day season and Esau combined to teach me a lesson I won't forget soon. The other guy's work, which always looks easy, actually mever is -- except, perhaps for the other guy, who knows how to handle ft. And he can have it to handle, be- cause I don't want any part of it any more. I'll never envy him his soft touch again. In other words, unlike Esau, I won't buy it! Not at any price! Wearily yours, BILL COTTON. With FRANK R. WALKER | We have just returned from a week's fishing in upper Algonquin earth itself offers an endless Variety of scenic beauty, with Its vast oceans, great mountain ranges, mighty forests, its plains, rivers, lakes and other features. Think of the wealth of interest to be found in the innumerable varicties of trees, flowers, plants and other forms of vegetation that spring from the fertile soil, the countless species of animal life that swanms ~upon the land and in the waters. Nature in hey different moods, provides a continual source of in- terest. There are the shifting pat- terns of sunshine and cloud, the changes in the weather, the pro- cession of the seasons, the eternal cycle of birth life and death. But it is the human element that provides the greatest drama upon the great cosmic stage. What an exciting career is that of mankind! By reason of his brain and dexterity, man has won for himself supremacy over all the other creatures of earth. He has penetrated many of na- ture's secrets and used them for his adavantage. Ages ago he day? Even the element of un- till the. soil and grow food, to train animals to work for him. As time passed he developed a social organization and a code of law and behavior. He built towns and cities, reared temples and other great structures, and produced many beautiful works of art. Man has achieved much and passed through many stages. of development. But within the past | century or so the pace of change has become a mad, headlong rush -- possibly towards disaster. Year by year the machinery of ecivili- zation grows more and more com- plex. Population grows and spreads and cities become bigger and ever bigger. There are wars and up- heavals, strikes and revolutions, with the threat of worse to come. And always the search for knowl- edge goes on, and man increases his conquests over nature. What imaginative romance of fiction could compare, for mag- nitude and fascination, with the world in which we are living to- day? Even the elemént of un- certainty 'and danger that sur- rounds us gives piquancy to the great drama. And there is also the "possibility, the hope, that some 'of 'the great problems con- fronting humanity may be solved, and a better time may be ahead for everybody. In any case, the world and its inhabitants pro- vide a source of never-failing in-. terest for those who can appre- cate it. For anyone possessed of sense of natural curiosity, life on this planet should never be dull. Park a by C. W. Potter and H. D. Conkey, of Mendota, Illinois. We had one Of the most successful fishing trips. we have had in a long time. We tried fishing at first in Cari- bou Lake, near Port Loring and later on the north shore of Lake Nipissing but unfortunately the wind and the weather were against us so we went over to Lake Ope- ongo in the Park and then from there to Happy Isle Lake where the bass could be caught by the bushel basket. We got our limit running up to four pounds and- after that, of course, we released all fish that we caught. We had two good feeds of bass and lake trout and we came back with our legal limit of bass and a half a dozen nice lake trout running to three and a half Ibs. Yours truly was fortunate enough to latch on to a lake trout on a copper line which unfortu- nately we did not land but it straightened the hooks out on a large Willlams Wobbler. We don't know how big it was but we do know that any fish big enough to straighten the hooks on any bait is big enough for the records. Last week in my talk at the Club I stressed conservation, some agree and I know a reat many do not agree. There are too few people to-day that realize how important conservation actually is but we had it brought home to us this week in a discussion with the men in charge of the scientific laboratories of the Fish and Wild Life Division of the Department of Lands and Forests in Algonquin Park, We were amazed to find that the cycle of feed in Algonquin Park waters is so limited that the reproduction of mature fish an- nually is in the neighbourhood of 2 pounds per acre of water. That is only 2 pounds of fish reach ma- turity per year over the average for ome acre of water in all the lakes in Algonquin Park. This is due to the fact that the plankton that the small minnows and small fish feed on is not in sufficient quantities, consequently, the large fish do not feed at a rate fast enough to bring them to maturity. Two pounds of fish per acre means that this week we came back with approximately 40 pounds of bass and 15 pounds of lake trout. That means we have depleted one acre for 27 years. Figures like this make one seriously consider the future, when all fishing will be so severely restricted it won't be worthwhile even owning a fishing rod unless something very serious is done. We are extremely fortunate in Ontario of haying probably the most efficient Fish and Wild Life Division in the whole of North America and probably In the world. The boys study their job, and they do it with great effi- clency, sometimes we disagree with their decisions, but our dis- agreements are mainly based on a selfish motive and thers are based on scientific facts. It would mot surprise me one bit to see lakes in Algonquin Park closed for a perfod of two years rather than alternate years, and eventually LIFE Never Does! Life undertook to explain. side of religion; more frantically; Stating it was difficult to fradulent editorializing at such goings on. Recently Life Magazine edtorialized, in a most moralizing tone, about the terrible aspects it termed it.\Life stated that, on the Hearst, many people from all walks of life had come forward to say words of praise for the departed. Finding this strange, of "Hearst Journalism," as death of the famed It was because the Hearst press had always been on the and had always waved the Stars and Stripes and had sung the Star Spangled Banner more loudly. To speak disparagingly of the man who had lead this policy in so many papers would have smacked almost of lack of patriotism. So people were afraid to say what they really thought, Life suggested. argue or fight with a man who stood in a church wrapped in his country's flag, Life deplor ed that such should be permitted as an excuse for biased, .. . and piously looked down its nose To anyone who followed the completely biased reporting and ight papers. If Life's approach to the learned from others . . . U.S. publishing business . . . flag waving in any country use were there in profusion. Henry Luce, throw the first stone . . . lishing business. ahead of him, that way. show the fire brigade item . . . . (Continued on Page 16) our perfume. publisher of Most interesting suggestion yet: ng in which this mag- azine indulged following the firing of an American General the Present Holler-Than-Thou position of the magazine is an in- teresting example of opportunism. The opportunity of Hearst's death was siezed by the publisher to try and convince many folk that Life does not adopt any such wicked practices, and therefore is a much finer publication than all of the Hearst MacArthur doings was = not standing wrapped in the American flag while biasedly pound- ing away on a topic--its hate of the present government of the USA--with all the dispicable, tricks the magazine has and possibly Hearst, who certainly was not a good "happening" for the some of them from then there never has been any before. The aspect of religion for the sake of public support, usually practiced by Life with the greatest enthusiasm, was not included with the General's build-up' to any great extent. But all the other Ingredients that Life would now have its readers believe it would never, never Life, certainly undertook to and should have been the last to do 0. The Hearst press, under the control of Mr. Hearst, did not serve its country with distinction. Yellow journalism is still to be seen here and there as a result of the effect it created, but nowhere more evident than in Life maganzine ever since the end of the last war. Life magazine does the same things, only it doesn't do them as well. Or at least we hope it doesn't, for the sake of world peace and unity, and the integrity of the pub- edd ing Comitnernt A piece of advice for the back-to-school gang that we have spent our life trying to live up to. Always think the other fellow is smarter than you are . like the dickens to prove he isn't. You'd be surprised how often you'll find you're even, or maybe just a little . . then work: Ee like a lucky reporter last week, when we drove by a grass fire on the hospital property just as the siren went to was on the way. One volunteer fire- man also passed, and under his instruction half the conflagra- tlon was out when the fire truck arrived. Then ome wit on the brigade, which has more than its full share of men with a sense of humor, asked us if we'd set the fire fo get a news thus robbing us of the opportunity to do a little kidding ourselves. So this is our way of getting even. Perfume bottles won't break or leak easily when you travel if you wrap them tightly in a piece of aluminum foil. We must try that .. . we have the darndest time with Next time we travel