COMMUNICATION TO THE MAYOR IN RELATION TO THE CHILDREN'S INSTITUTIONS DEPARTMENT.

BOSTON, February 1, 1911.

HON. JOHN F. FITZGERALD, Mayor:

SIR, On September 24, 1910, Your Honor requested the Finance Commission to consider whether the Legislature should be asked for authority to transfer to the state the duty of providing for boys now sent to the Suffolk School for Boys at Rainsford Island and there maintained at the expense of the City of Boston. The commission has considered the question and respectfully submits its report herewith.

The financial question involved is whether the Commonwealth should pay for the care of Boston boys, such as are now sent to the Suffolk School, as it does for boys who live in other cities and towns in the state and are sent to state institutions; or whether the City of Boston should continue the maintenance of the Suffolk School at its sole expense, and at the same time pay about 35 per cent. (as its share of the state tax) of the cost of all similar institutions in the state.

The city pays about $50,000 annually for maintaining the Suffolk School. If it were maintained by the state the city would pay only its share of the state tax for this institution, about one-third of the entire cost, and would thus save about $33,000 a year.

The opportunity to save this large amount of money should not be neglected by the city unless it should appear that the boys transferred to the state schools would not be as well taken care of as they are at the Suffolk School. In order to learn whether the transfer would be beneficial, the Finance Commission caused

an investigation to be made of the conditions existing at the Suffolk School for Boys, the Lyman School at Westborough and the Industrial School for Boys at Shirley. As a result of this investigation the commission has concluded that the condition of the boys would on the whole be improved by the transfer.

The following objections, however, were raised to the transfer:

1. That the state schools, by reason of their distance from the city and the cost of transportation, would be inaccessible to many Boston parents.

2. That boys of the Catholic faith might upon reaching the probation period be placed out with families of a different faith, if the duty of placing out were transferred from the trustees of the Boston school to the trustees of the state schools.

3. That more Boston boys would be taught farming and fewer would receive industrial training if they were sent to the state schools.

4. That fewer probationers would be placed with their own families by the trustees of the state schools than are so placed by the trustees of the Suffolk School, and that consequently there would be more estrangements between children and parents.

CONSIDERATION OF THESE OBJECTIONS.

1. Inaccessibility.- The City of Boston now furnishes free passage on the boat which goes to the Suffolk School at Rainsford Island, but it would cost 75 cents for a round trip to the Lyman School at Westborough, $1.22 on the Boston & Maine Railroad, and $1.30 on the New York, New Haven & Hartford Railroad, for a round trip to the Berlin Branch of the Lyman School, and $1.82 for a round trip to the Shirley School. If the parents of the boys were obliged to incur this expense the number of visits would undoubtedly be lessened, as the parents of such children are usually poor. Boston parents would then be in the same position as parents who reside in other cities and towns of the Common

wealth, as the latter are obliged to pay for their transportation to the state institutions, and in many cases from points at a greater distance than the distance between such institutions and the City of Boston. If the law permits it, an appropriation could be made by the city to pay for the transportation of Boston parents. The amount needed for this purpose would not be more than $2,000, and probably would not exceed $1,000. If the city should appropriate the money, Boston parents would be able to make as many visits to the state institutions as they now make to the Suffolk School. Moreover, the visits would be longer in duration, as the rules of the Suffolk School restrict such visits to one-half hour once a month, whereas at the Lyman School a two hours' visit once a month is permitted; at the Berlin Branch of the Lyman School one visit a month is permitted and the visitor may remain all day if he chooses, and at the Shirley School one visit a month is permitted for a time as long as the superintendent sees fit to allow.

2. Religious Difficulties. It is admitted that the opportunities for religious instruction at the Lyman and Shirley Schools are as good as those afforded at the Suffolk School; and no complaints of discrimination against boys of any faith have been made so far as religious instruction at the schools themselves is concerned. On the other hand, it is admitted that the trustees of the Lyman School have not found Catholic homes for as large a percentage of their Catholic boys who have reached the probation period as the trustees of the Boston institution have. Thus, the Superintendent of the Lyman School Probationers, in a report made in August of last year, said:

Of the boys at board, 31 Protestant boys are in Protestant homes, 15 Catholic boys in Catholic homes, and 35 Catholic boys in Protestant homes. Of the boys in the second list, those earning wages and self-supporting, 52 Protestant boys are in Protestant homes, 13 Catholic boys in Catholic homes, and 58 Catholic boys in Protestant homes.

From this it appears that of 121 Roman Catholic boys in the Placing-Out Division of the Lyman School, 93 or 76.8 per cent had been placed with Protestant families, and only 28 or 23.2 per cent. had been placed with people of their own faith. But the list of Suffolk School boys, on November 14 of last year, showed that of the 33 boarded out or indentured all had been placed with people of their own faith, and 29 of these boys were Roman Catholics. Notwithstanding these facts, the reports of the superintendent of the Lyman School indicate that constant efforts are being made to find homes for children in families of their own faith, and the cooperation of Catholic clergymen is earnestly sought. It also appears that even though children are not placed in the homes of people of their own faith, an attempt is made to have such children attend the church to which their parents belong. In such cases the following notice is sent to the pastor:

To the pastor of

WESTBORO, MASS.

church,

Owing to our inability to find a suitable Catholic home for

We bespeak your interest and kind offices in his behalf. He is instructed to attend your church regularly.

Yours very truly,

LYMAN SCHOOL FOR BOYS.

Visitor.

The Finance Commission believes that the trustees of the Lyman School can succeed as well as the trustees of the Children's Institutions Department of Boston in placing children out with families of their own religious faith; and it is confident that after the proposed transfer has been made the placing-out will be conducted

with a scrupulous regard for the religious sentiments of the children, their parents and the entire community. This branch of the work should be transacted so as to leave no possible room for legitimate complaint from people of any religious belief.

3. Unsuitable Training for City Boys. It has been urged that more Boston boys would be taught farming at the state schools, and thus made less fit for city vocations. The commission believes that the opportunities to learn farming, which the state schools afford, would benefit Boston boys who are now denied such opportunities at the Suffolk School. The many advantages of farm training for boys who have lived under unwholesome physical and moral conditions in the city are obvious. There are, however, at the state schools ample facilities for giving industrial training to such boys as are not adapted to farm work. Thus, although the facilities for making shoes at the Suffolk School are better than at the Lyman School, the latter school has greater opportunity for training in carpentry, cabinet work, woodturning, blacksmithing, laundry work, masonry and painting. The facilities for industrial training at the Shirley School seem well adapted for the uses of the class of boys who are sent there. At both institutions there is plenty of land available for the erection of new buildings which may be required to increase the facilities for manual training. At the Suffolk School, owing to the small quantity of land, there are no opportunities for such expansion.

The commission believes that the welfare of the boys who are now sent to the Suffolk School would be promoted in a high degree if they were allowed to embrace the more liberal opportunities for both agricultural and industrial training which the state schools afford.

4. Family Estrangements. It has been said that as the Lyman School trustees place out a smaller proportion of probationers with their own families than the trustees of the Suffolk School do, there would be more estrangements between parents and children if the