OCR Text |
Show Wachingtcn and Its "Alley-Houses" WASHINGTON At a conference confer-ence on the alley situation In this city before the subcommittee subcom-mittee of the District committee com-mittee of which .Senator Copeland is chairman, the New York senator said that living conditions in the slums of the national capital are worse than In the slums of New York. This statement, state-ment, he added, was based upon his personal inspection of Washington's alleys. The general discussion of the entire subject resulted in the adoption of a program of which the salient features are : Publication of the names of owners of alley properties that are in insanitary insani-tary condition; district commissioners, commission-ers, acting under existing law to notify noti-fy owners to clean up or tear down property that has gone beyond possible repair; residents of alley houses and owners of vacant lots used as dumping places for rubbish to be notified to place all refuse material by a specific date where it may be removed ; district dis-trict commissioners to work out a plan for the removal of this refuse; senate committee to use its influence for an appropriation that will enable a thorough thor-ough cleaning up of the capital ; wooden wood-en fences dividing dooryards and along alleys, constituting a fire menace, to be removed and wire substituted where necessary. Senator Copeland, who, as health officer of New York city has had considerable con-siderable experience in municipal housecleaning, made it plain he was not advocating the ejection of cccu-pants cccu-pants of alley houses. "I do not believe be-lieve in paternalism or in the government govern-ment going out and building houses," he said; "but we can have regulations and enforce them regarding decent living liv-ing conditions." Engineer Commissioner Bell said the owners got a return of from 15. to 30 per cent on their ramshackle houses. He reported that 271 buildings, build-ings, valued at S5S.OO0, had been condemned, con-demned, and that better work in that direction could be done if there were an adequate number of inspectors. In the course of the discussion of one phase of the situation when the commissioners pleaded lack of authority, author-ity, Senator Copeland replied grimly: "Sometimes it is a good thing to go ahead and do these things and get the authority afterward." Observing that the federal authorities authori-ties bad gone into the Canal Zone, into in-to Porto Rico and other territories and "cleaned them up," Senator Ball, chairman of the District committee, said he could see no reason why the federal authorities should not clean up the national capital. . He thought congress had neglected its duty in this respect. 1 |