West side of the avenue, is not sufficiently extensive for a Park, or 

 that it is not of convenient access to the masses for whose use it is 

 designed. If so, then neither the necessity nor the expediency of im- 

 proving the Eastern side in addition to the other, and of thereby per- 

 manently abstracting from our City's domain a large amount of tax- 

 able property is by any means certain. In the judgment of the Com- 

 mittee this improvement ought not to be made ; and they believe the 

 opinion of those who have to pay for public works — the taxpayers of 

 Brooklyn — is decidedly against its being made. This Board has repeat- 

 edly expressed its opinion to the same effect, in its annual reports, 

 giving the reasons therefor at length. 



In the address of the President at the public meeting above referred 

 to, which was afterwards published in our local newspapers, it was 

 stated that after retaining the Reservoir ground, with its beautiful 

 prospect, and a very considerable area for the accommodation of public 

 buildings and institutions, besides opening up a broad system of ap- 

 proaches to the Park, Eastward from Flatbush Avenue, the residue 

 of the land on the same side could be sold for three millions of dollars ; 

 and that by saving another million which it would cost to improve 

 this section as a Park, and adding it to the three millions for which 

 the land could be sold, a saving of four millions of dollars would be 

 effected, besides returning a large amount of property to the books of 

 the tax collector. 



The Committee think that, with the present great burden of public 

 debt and taxation resting upon our city, the saving of this large sum 

 of money would be a sound and wise economy; and they believe that 

 all thoughtful and prudent men, who are not biased by their ownership 

 of a large real estate on the Eastern side of the Avenue, will concur in 

 this opinion. The Committee cannot recommend the Board to fly in 

 the face of an enlightened public judgment, by proceeding to do, upon 

 the suggestion of a few interested persons, what would render the 

 saving of these four millions impossible. 



There is, it is said, a diversity of opinion on this question of spend- 

 ing or of saving four millions. Biit those who differ, belong mainly to 

 two classes of persons. One class own land in the vicinity of the pro- 

 posed improvement, and think their land will be greatly enhanced in value 

 by spending some millions of money to bring the Park to their doors. 

 While we do not concur in the opinion, believing that even their in- 

 terest will be better served by using this land for the erection of fine 



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