48 NATIONAL MUNICIPAL REVIEW

New York's Governor Speaks O u t Inescient Local Government Must Go, Colonel Lehmun

Oeclares OUR local rural governments are still struggling along with machinery

two hundred years old. They are now attempting to render forms of public service which were never dreamed of when they were first set up as units of administration. Even the most rural and sparsely populated have long since outworn the wheels of government with which they were equipped. And as we come to the more densely populated, the more suburban counties, towns and villages, it becomes obvious how hopeless, how futile, it is to try to make them function economically with their present administrative equipment. The wonder is that they can perform what they do, even with their extravagant and wasteful costs.

During the days of false prosperity taxpayers paid insufficient at- tention to their tax bills. While money was plentiful, the extravagance or wastefulness of local government was looked upon with comparative complacency. Times are now different. Taxpayers now appreciate the fact that every cent of direct tax which they pay goes to the support of local government alone-that none of it goes to Albany, and that none of it goes to Washington.

Much is to be desired, too, in the structure of city government generally in this state. The city of New York is not alone in this respect, The size of the metropolis, and the extent of its financial operations may unduly emphasize the defects of its administrative machinery, but equally grave defects exist in many of the other cities of the state. While the problems of the smaller cities are not so spectacular, they are equally important to their own citizens and tax- payers.

What are the important objectives for which we strive? What are the principal results which we seek in this movement toward the im- provement of local rural and city government? Certain fundamentals lie at the basis of reform. They are:

1. The consolidation of the various agencies and functions of local government.

2 . The reduction of all operating expenses made necessary by these times.

3. The rearrangement of local financial agencies in order definitely to fix budgetary responsibility.

4. The precise and complete fixation of administrative and execu- tive responsibility.

These form the goal for which we should work. HERBERT H. LEHMAN

(inaugural address, 1933)