OCR Text |
Show oo OGDEN TO VOTE ON COMMISSION FORM OF GOVERNMENT The commission form of govern ment in Ogden and Salt Lake is to be submitted to the citizens of the two cities In the nature of .a reterendum sometime in the early summer That promises to be the outcome of the present agitation for a change in the law enacted two years ago giving to Ogden and Salt Lake a modified form of the Ues Moines system of city government gov-ernment When the law was enacted the peo pic of Ogden were not consulted and the measure was forced on them by the mandate of the legislature That failure to obtain an expression of opinion now is to be remedied by a tardy appeal to the electorate. k Neither side, we are informed, objects ob-jects to this referendum Manifestly, that which the people want, they should have But the new form of government, as proposed in the com promise bill before the legislature, u-self u-self ignores the leferendum, through the instrumentality of which it is to be made law. The Standard pointed out, when the original bill was before the legisla turc, that the measure was faulty in that It neither provided for the recall or referendum, ihcit too much power was placed in tne hands of a triumvirate trium-virate without making the wielders of that power responsive or amenable to the people, and thai the new rorm ot government would prove satisfactory or objectionable in just the degree that those in control measured up to Mih expectations of the citizens; that the commission would magnity vhe efficiency or deficiency of the Individ uals on tint commission Every one now sees that the Standard was right and yet the proposed law takes no cognizance of this weakness in the present city government. The legislature, in provid'ng meanr for submitting the whole question, should grant to the people the right to say whether they desire to have included in the new form of govern ! ment the recall. Initiative and refer I endum There is one serious objection to the law as now framed Here in Og-I Og-I den the commissioners all are from one ward, living within a stone's throw of eacb other. That does away with ward representation and, to that I extent, upsets a representative form j of government which carries responsibility respon-sibility into each subdivision of the i city. We have our national) state, coun tv. city and ward organizations for the very purpose of extending to earh unit as great n degree of local self-government as Is posaible and still retain n united and ro-oprratho whole Here In Ogden the wards hnvc been Ignored and, although wo cannot say that sei fish Interests so far have been exhibited exhibit-ed to the extent of discriminating In favor of any particular ward, otlll the possibility exlflta that at nomo future lime there will U unequal distribution distribu-tion of ntreet repairs r.nd the other benefits that flow from city expenditures |