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N event of more than ordinary significance to all who are interested in city planning, and especially in that phase of it having to do with the ideal development of residential districts, was the recent awarding of prizes in connection with the "Four Corners Competition,' held under the auspices of Throop College of Technology, of Pasadena, Cal.

The competition, which was participated in by a number of architects, landscape architects and artists of ability both in Southern California and elsewhere, was the outgrowth of a study of actual conditions in Pasadena. Some time ago an unsightly shack was erected upon one of the prominent corners in a fine Crown City residence district and rented to a fruit vendor. A little later another owner built a hardly more prepossessing store for a groceryman on an opposite corner. The residents of the district took alarm and began an agitation to save the other two corners. Out of that agitation grew the Throop competition.

The prizes were offered with the idea of securing in graphic, understandable form inspirations for something better in neighborhood center developments. The problem taken up was just such a problem as had been brought home to the Pasadena neighborhood mentioned, and the competitors were asked to draw up plans for the ideal treatment of the "four corner" centers that inevitably spring up in every extensive residence area. It was hoped that in this way interest might be awakened in the question of the intelligent, effective and artistic arrangement of these, the smallest units in the great city plan.

The competitors were asked to assume that the value per acre of the land on each corner of their community centers was $12,500, and to consider the limit of expenditure allowed for improvements at from $35,000 to $55,000 per corner.

Other

wise full latitude was given to their inventiveness and originality of taste.

The committee of award, comprising architects John C. Austin, Elmer Grey and Albert R. Walker, of Los Angeles, gave the first prize of $200 to Paul R. Williams, of Los Angeles. The second prize of $100 went to the Cook-Rankin-Wyckoff Company, landscape architects, Los Angeles. Porter W. Dorr and Alex. J. Scholtes, of Boston, were given the third prize of $50. The judges in announcing their award stated that the margin of choice between the first two sketches was slight.

Prize Design

The design winning the first prize shows. one corner devoted to a trading center, but with stores set back from the street and entrances grouped in an open arcade, making it possible to secure display space without using the sidewalks, or unnecessarily calling attention to the commercial character of the building. Delivery wagons are relegated to the rear through two driveways, and provision is made for an automobile garage and market stalls on the back of the lot.

On the corner directly opposite, an apartment is shown of the same general type of architecture. The pleasing feature of this part of the design is the "homelike" appearance of the building with its front lawn and ample space for playgrounds and flower garden in the rear. The "neighborhood church" and "community house" on a third corner suggest possibilities of cooperation in religion and recreation, which might well be considered in every neighborhood, particularly in the outlying districts.

Upon the fourth corner, the design shows a combination of a small park and an automobile fire-engine house. Such an arrangement, it is explained, would allow the firemen to spend their surplus time pleasantly and profitably in maintain

Building and Loan Association LYNCHBURG, VA.-The recent successful promotion by the Chamber of Commerce of a local Mutual Building and Loan Association is, perhaps, unique in commercial organization work, as these institutions are usually started by a few real estate men who realize possibly more than others the need of such in the development of a community.

The new association in Lynchburg makes a start with nearly 300 stockholders, who have subscribed to a total of something over 2,000 shares. The plan of organization is the same as that used in every part of the state of North Carolina, where in one or two cities these institutions have been in successful operation for thirty-three years.

In procuring a successful outcome of this project the Chamber of Commerce of Lynchburg was very ably assisted by Mr. E. L. Keesler, president of the North Carolina League of Building and Loan Associations.

The new association commenced business in August, and will open a new series every six months. Mr. B. B. Adams, a wellknown real estate man, is secretary, and Mr. D. M. Penick, head of a wholesale drug house, is president. The board of directors is made up of prominent bankers and busi

ness men.

A local mutual building and loan association, if operated under a properly restricted plan in which all stockholders participate alike, is a very useful medium for the encouragement of thrift and good citizenship among the wage-earning classes. To get

satisfactory results it is essential that the association be governed by a board of directors made up of men in the community who have no selfish motives and who are actuated by a desire to help the community.

The chief advantage in the association's being promoted by a commercial organization is that it establishes public confidence in the new organization and prevents the danger of its being handicapped by the suspicion of its being operated for the benefit of a few.

A Poultry Association

TAUNTON, MASS.-The Taunton Poultry Association has recently been formed by the Taunton Chamber of Commerce for the purpose of encouraging the raising of fancy and utility poultry, to develop a better market for poultry products, and to arouse greater interest in the subject through the holding of an annual poultry exhibition.

This latest organization to be formed by the members of the Taunton Chamber of Commerce is the outgrowth of the poultry show which was held in Taunton some months ago, when the need of such an association was strongly emphasized. All residents of Taunton and vicinity are eligible to membership, and it is felt that membership in the association will be especially valuable to the poultry owners themselves.

There will be monthly meetings of the organization. It is the intention to have prominent and successful poultry men address the sessions upon the proper methods of housing, incubating, brooding, caponizing, marketing, preparing poultry for the exhibition room, and all matters of interest to owners of poultry.

The second annual poultry show is to be held under the auspices of the Chamber of Commerce, and it is expected that it will be unusually successful as a result of the activities of the Taunton Poultry Association.

Organization News in City Daily

WINONA, MINN.-The Winona Association of Commerce has found that it is much easier to acquaint non-members as well as members with the efforts of its organization by the insertion of a few columns weekly in one of the Winona dailies than by the publication of a weekly or monthly bulletin. The feeling was that an official "organ," to make an imposing appearance, must contain so much material that a large amount of it is lost upon busy men; also, since an association bulletin is

mailed only to members, news of its affairs would not thus reach the general public, as would be the case when published in the daily papers.

An arrangement, therefore, was entered into with the Winona Daily RepublicanHerald to act as a medium of information through its news columns between the management and members of the Association of Commerce. A weekly department has been established in the paper entitled "Association of Commerce Notes." At the end of each week's collection of notes appears the statement, "Continued next Tuesday." A little over four newspaper columns were devoted to the matter in a recent issue of the paper, and the various subjects were handled exactly as if they were published in an organization bulletin. This publicity costs the Association absolutely nothing except the time consumed in its preparation.

Under the heading "News and Views of the Elizabeth Board of Trade," a similar weekly department is being conducted in the Evening Times of Elizabeth, N. J., and is dealing definitely and broadly with local and foreign trade conditions.

Municipal Control of Water Front

OAKLAND, CAL.-A plan for the management of the harbor and water front, under which the municipal wharves are to be con

structed and operated and the general system of transportation by water developed to high efficiency, has been worked out by the Oakland Chamber of Commerce. Other local organizations have coöperated in the development of this plan, which has been approved by the city government.

The plan provides for a Board of Harbor Commissioners, who are to be appointed by the Mayor and are to have complete control of the policies relating to the harbor and water front government and management. Provision is also made for the appointment of a Harbor Manager as the executive officer of the Harbor Commission. He will be expected to supervise the construction, maintenance, and management of all the wharves and water front properties and of the harbor in general; one of his special duties being the development of traffic for the municipal wharves.

Under a state grant, Oakland's city government has complete and unrestricted power to control and govern all of the water front of the city. One of the duties of the Port Commissioners will be to formulate rules and regulations, and, if necessary, recommend legislation, city or state, that may be necessary to make effective this right; including the prescribing of rules and regulations for the conduct of business over wharves held under lease, or otherwise, by railroads or other business or private interests.

The Washington Alleys

On August 6, the day that Mrs. Wilson, the wife of the President, died, it was reported that Congress had, at her dying request, passed a model bill to eliminate objectionable alleys and bad housing condition in Washington. The report was given wide circulation, but, unfortunately, it was an erroneous report, for it was only the Senate that took action that day, and it passed a bill that had originated in the Senate. This was not the model bill that had been introduced in the House of Representatives after it had been drawn up with very great care by a committee of

Washington men and women and approved by both Mrs. Wilson and the President. Some days later the House District Committee reported favorably the model bill, but a week later it was set aside and the Senate bill given the right of way, and on September 14 it was passed. The Senate bill really represents very little advance in the alley proposition, for it is not much more than a reenactment of an act of 1892, which then prohibited further construction of alley houses and provided regulations for those already existing.

The model bill, unfortunately set aside, proposed the gradual but actual elimination

of the existing houses and the bad housing in Washington, and in minute detail provided the methods and procedure by which they could be eliminated during a period. covering ten years. The bill just passed. contains none of those details, and the only respect in which it represents an advance is that it specifies that the present structures shall be done away with by the first of July, 1918, but provides no machinery or instruction for the consummation of the work. To be effective, the new bill must be followed by supplementary legislation which will place definitely on the municipal authorities the responsibility for tearing down the poor dwellings already standing and transforming objectionable alleys, many of them inside alleys and courts, into regular thoroughfares. To the extent that the bill represents an expression of the desires of the people of Washington for improved alley conditions, it is considered a step in the right direction, but it is by no means the model bill which had been so carefully drawn and which Mrs. Wilson so deeply wished to be enacted into law. RICHARD B. WATROUS.

Home Rule in Taxation

At the November election the people of California will have an opportunity to ratify an important home rule amendment passed by the 1913 legislature. The form in which this proposed amendment to the state constitution will appear on the ballot is as follows:

LOCAL TAXATION EXEMPTION. Assembly Constitutional Amendment 7 adding section 8% to Article XIII of Constitution, authorizes any county or munici pality to exempt from taxation for local purposes in whole or in part, any one or more of following classes of property: Improvements in, on, or over land; shipping; household furniture; live stock; merchandise; chinery; tools; farming imple. ments; vehicles; other personal property except franchises; provides that ordinance or resolution making such exemptions shall be subject to referendum; and requires that taxes upon property not exempt from taxation shall be uniform.

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YES

NO

An amendment intended to accomplish a similar purpose was submitted by initiative petition in 1912, but was not adopted. That amendment was so broad that it would have permitted any county or local district to

establish its own tax system, including the methods and dates of collection, etc., and it was opposed strongly on the ground that it would have led to administrative chaos. The present amendment confines the local option to a selection of the class of property which shall be exempted from county or local taxation. It does not affect taxation for state purposes. California recently adopted the policy of separating the sources of state and local revenue pursuant to an amendment adopted in 1910, so there is now no state tax on property locally assessed (except a special tax for the San Francisco Exposition).

The principle of home rule in taxation has been approved by the California League of Municipalities at its last three annual conventions. The amendment has also been endorsed by more than thirty individual city councils throughout the state.

Municipal Carnival at Los Angeles

On September 8 Los Angeles celebrated the one hundred and thirty-third anniversary of its foundation in an exceptionally interesting carnival. The celebration, which was under the auspices of the Municipal Employees' Club, attracted crowds estimated to number about 35,000. As all the participants gave their services without charge, many important concerns contributing generously in a material way, the expense incurred was slight. To defray this, bronze medals commemorating the anniversary were sold at the price of ten cents.

The decorations included an elaborate arrangement of electric lights, strung in lines up the hill upon which is located the Normal School building about which the festivities centered, and converging at the dome of the building in a massive electric seal of the city. Entertainment was furnished simultaneously in different parts of the grounds and building. While playground activities, such as Indian dances, camp-fire songs and a Hiawatha pantomime, held the attention of onlookers in one place, other features, including police drills, exhibits of fire fighting, and band concerts, attracted the visitors in another section. A ukalele chorus of boys representing the schools and the Civic Theatre roamed about interspersing music. In one corner of the grounds open-air motion pic