44 
Needs of the Garden 
Increased Municipal A ppropriation for Maintenance.—For the 
past two years the city appropriations for maintenance have not 
been adequate to meet actually necessary expenditures, not to 
speak of additional expenses deemed essential for efficient main- 
tenance and for a reasonable amount of annual developmental 
work. At the beginning of the year nothing had been done, 
except the construction of walks, toward the development of 
about five acres comprising the south addition, and yet this area 
is prominently located and is probably the most thickly traversed 
portion of our grounds. Formerly crossed by a roadway, and 
having served for a number of years for the deposit and burning 
of refuse from Prospect Park, it was sorely in need of grading, 
soil improvement, seeding and shrub planting, but our city appro- 
priation for labor was barely sufficient to maintain already de- 
veloped areas in a creditable manner. Had it not been for private 
contributions it would have been necessary for us to have done 
almost no developmental work, or else to have discharged all of 
our day laborers in July. 
Two years ago it became absolutely necessary to appoint an 
assistant secretary to serve as stenographer to the director and 
as assistant to the secretary of the Garden in the general work of 
the public office. The city has for two years declined to make an 
appropriation for the salary of this position, so that for 1917, as 
for 1915-16, the salary must be met from private funds. 
It will also be necessary to provide private funds next year for 
a custodian of buildings and for additional janitor service, made 
necessary by the completion of our laboratory building and plant 
houses, which gives over five times as much building to be cared 
for as we have had hitherto. 
The most unfortunate feature of this situation is that private 
funds uséd for maintenance are diverted from the important edu- 
cational and scientific work for which the Garden was primarily 
established. The maintenance of our plant thus involves the 
crippling and curtailing of the work for which the plant exists.: 
Increased. Endowment—Of the entire income credited from. 
endowment for 1916 ($3,327.79), all but $324.14 was needed for 
salaries, and has been similarly assigned in the private funds 
