"For a Greater Cartersville. To the Citizens of Cartersville:
"We hereby make formal announcement of our candidacies for Aldermen of the City of Cartersville, based on a statement of our position with reference to the contemplated sale of our light and gas franchises to the Georgia Power Company and the relation of such sale to the immediate development of hydro-electric power on Etowah River at our very doors.
"The power company offers to purchase our light and power distributing system and our gas plant and distributing system, together with the grant of a franchise right to continue to do a light, power, and gas business in Cartersville at and for the sum of $300,-000. The franchise right sought is not a perpetual franchise, as has been erroneously charged, nor an exclusive franchise, as some would have you believe, but, on the contrary, the city does in fact reserve the right to reestablish itself in the same business whenever it finds it wise or expedient to do so. The offer further provides that in the event a sale is consummated on these terms, the power company obligates itself to develop the hydro-electric power on Etowah River. In the event the Etowah River power development is not undertaken within a few months and pushed to completion, then no sale of the light and gas franchise takes place and these properties revert to the city.
"Sale Advantageous to the City. We believe a sale at $300,000 would be a fair and very advantageous one for the city to make. With that amount of money we could at once pay off all our bonded and floating indebtedness, amounting to approximately $1S0, 000, and thus stop interest amounting to something like $10,000 a year. The balance we can take in cash, or, if the city prefers, in deferred payments bearing 6 per cent. interest, over a spread of ten, fifteen, or twenty years. We would then be in a substantially fine financial condition.
"Future Welfare of our Schools Involved. We could then make the necessary school improvements and meet the demands of the educational authorities of the State with reference to our High' School. We do not confine ourselves to a mere statement that we favor education, but we favor a given and certain program to insure its accomplishment. We favor the erection of a high school sufficient in size and facilities to furnish our boys and girls, and those immediately about us, a system of study and research to enable them to be equipped for life and business. Education counts for efficiency. A man or woman's opportunity and future, in this age, depends largely upon the school facilities
provided by local government. Our children are our greatest asset, infinitely more valuable than the merely material value of a city franchise. We want it to be so that a diploma from a Cartersville High School will be, in itself, a guarantee of entrance to the higher schools of learning. We are unwilling to longer endure the shame and humiliation involved in the threat that, because of a lack of proper high school facilities, the value of a diploma from our high school will be taken from us. We do not see how, nor has any one else submitted a plan by which we can erect, or buy, or in any other way secure a high school worthy to be termed such. Cartersville is close to the limit of her debt-making power, and we have no money in the treasury. It is therefore mere hollow sound to proclaim in favor of education and a high school under existing conditions in Cartersville.
"Real Service at Fair Rates Imperative. A light, power, and gas business, to be satisfactory, must render service, and at fair rates. Such service ought to be commensurate with the needs of the community in which the business is being carried on. Admittedly the gas service has been poor, uncertain, undependable, and vexatious. It has been a money-loser for the city, as well as for the user. But the city has not provided facilities by which household users of electricity can be had. True, it has recently published a rate for such uses; but something more than a mere rate must be furnished. Meters must be installed and transformers supplied by the city, wiring must be done, stoves, frigidaires, washing-machines, electric cooking utensils, carpet-sweepers, and churns must be provided. Is the city in position to finance this late undertaking so that it can provide the power and the user can provide the device? If the publication of such a rate does not bring about a substantial and general use of the rate, then the adoption of such a rate is illusory and vexatious and better not to have been adopted at all. If such a rate can only be used by a rich man, who can afford to buy and pay cash for all such equipment, it may be better for a city, supposed to be governed and operated for the rich and poor alike, to confine itself to rates that can be used by all alike. We are very sure the city will find out, when it counts up at the end of the accounting period, that what it has paid out to install schedules SB and SC will be more than what it has taken in on these schedules, and yet will have favored only those who can be counted on the fingers of one's hands. The power company can and will make these uses available to all alike. It promises to establish a supply-house here, maintain an office, make this city its regional headquarters covering its operations in a number of towns and villages, do business with our banks, ana make itself a citizen of the county.
"Does it Yield a Real Profit? It may be urged that the light and power distributing system is a profit-yielding business to the City of Cartersville, and that because of the promised growth of the city, it will be a much greater paying investment. But we must close our eyes to the fact that no depreciation has been charged; that there has been and is a process of deterioration going on; that we have issued bonds to improve the system; and that the court records of Bartow county disclose that charges are made that the run-down and negligent condition of its lines has caused death to foot passengers on the streets of Cartersville.
"We do not wish to be accused of bearing the value of the system; but it is nevertheless true the city has been charging exorbitant rates for light and power for many years. Its governing authorities, sensing this fact, have just inaugurated some very radical reductions in rates. Ultimately, however, these new rates will be reflected in the reduced income, so that at no time hereafter will the city be able to show a very wide difference between receipts and disbursements. All of which merely goes to show, after all, that as long as the citizens of Cartersville pay an exorbitant rate for light and power a large income can be shown, or else a reduced rate will bring about a much reduced income. But even the reduced rate is not as low as that offered by the power company, so that the net result is that the city is paying taxes in power and light rates more than would have been or need now to pay to private enterprise.
"Could Again Own Our Own System. Nor are we cut off from the benefits that follow in the steps of a growing city. Should it become so, we can use one-third of the money we are offered and restore with new equipment, lines, poles, wires, and a distributing system, and enter into business again. If our city at any time, for any reason, decides to re-enter the business, it can do so and again establish the municipal system over the same streets, alleys, and ways into the same homes, offices, and business houses. In other words, we can replace our old poles, wires, lines, and physical equipment for new poles, wires, lines, and physical equipment for $100,000, for the very good reason that the power company is not asking for, nor is it contemplated to sell it, an exclusive franchise. We would yet have $200,000 with which to provide schoolhouses and such other needed public improvements as may be required.
"Real Progress Knocking At Our Door. We do not believe we ought to stand in the way of the contemplated development of Etowah River any longer. We have been offered a fair price, more than three times the value of the physical property. If it is said the franchise value is worth more than the balance of $200,000, it must be remembered that
the city can go right back into the business within a month and take every customer of the power company away from it. In which case would it be worth $200,000? We believe the city has been offered a fair price and if we fail to accept this opportunity we will be standing in the way of our material and cultural progress.
"The power company agrees, if it buys the city franchise, to develop the hydro-electric energy of Etowah River within this county. We thus bring into this county at once an expenditure of from $7,000, 000 to $10,000, 000 for construction of dam and power plants alone.
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