48 Missouri Agricultural Report. 



Greene county have signed a volunteer statement to the effect that the 

 County Highway Engineer fills a long felt want, and that the position 

 saved $4,000.00 in different ways to Greene county in the year 1908. 



The cost of the County Highway Engineer to the county is not 

 greater, in many instances, than the sum of the fees paid out under the 

 old fee system. Take, for example, the county of Buchanan, where this 

 year the amount of salaries paid into the County Highway Engineer's 

 office was $4,400.00, and the year preceding the advent of the County 

 Engineer the fees for road supervision cost the county $4,608.00. In 

 Chariton county the salarj^ of County Highway Engineer is $2,000.00. 

 while the last year before the engineering supervision the fees paid the 

 ex officio road and bridge commissioner were $2,194.00. In Johnson 

 county a similar comparison shows the fees under the last year of the 

 old law to have been $1,550.00, the County Highway Engineer's salary 

 is $1,200.00. In Pettis county the fees were $1,280.00 and salary of en- 

 gineer is $1,400.00. In Mississippi county the fees were $1,330.00 and 

 salary of the engineer is $900.00. In Scott coimty the fees for road 

 supervision averaged over the seven years preceding the County High- 

 way Engineer act, $1,730.00, not including fees of records of several in- 

 stances where special commissioners were employed. The County En- 

 gineer's salary is $1,500.00. Besides this, the engineer has the super- 

 vision of road and bridge work, of the overseei*s, of the surveying, ditch- 

 ing and clearing of the right-of-way, and a number more of other duties 

 are required of him than were required of any man luider the old sys- 

 tem, or ever will be required of an ex officio County Highway Engineer. 

 His whole time and attention is required upon the county's roads, for 

 which the county is paying but little or no more than it formerly paid 

 out in fees for inferior service. And, furthermore, the pay of the county 

 engineer does not keep the amount of his salary from the roads, because 

 he is paid out of the county funds, as any other county officer is paid, 

 and not from the road funds. 



A STANDARD OF QUALIFICATIONS FOR HIGHWAY ENGINEERS. 



Unfortunately, some of our highway engineers are not qualified to 

 hold their office. We should have an examining board, competent to 

 judge and fix a standard of highway engineers, and require each en- 

 gineer to obtain a license from this board. 



A CASH SYSTEM OF ROAD TAXES AND REGULARLY ORGANIZED ROAD CREW. 



We should do away with the labor tax system. The working out of 

 taxes is an inadequate, inefficient and indefensible form of revenue. We 



