6o 



Commission would surely have received full value for the funds 

 expended. 



Manifestly, a Commission, residents and property owners of 

 the county, obtaining money from the Freeholders of the county 

 for mosquito extermination work, have a more direct and vital 

 supervision over such work than outside corporations, foreign 

 to the county, who look at the work purely from a point of 

 view of profit. The work of the Commissioners is purely an 

 unselfish one, and they receive, so far as I know, no remunera- 

 tion whatsoever from the county. It would seem from the above 

 ' figures, drawn in deadly parallel, one against the other (the 

 Commission's work against private control work), would con- 

 clusively prove that it is better, all things being equal, to prose- 

 cute the mosquito extermination work under a Commission 

 rather than by private contract. Unfortunately, the summer of 



19 1 5 was probably the worst summer for mosquito breeding we 

 have had in southern New Jersey for upwards of ten years. So 

 far as the Little Silver contract was concerned, the taxpayers 

 who made the contract naturally expected more protection dur- 

 ing this very summer than ever before. The taxpayers freely 

 gave their money with the understanding that they were to be 

 entirely immune from: salt-marsh mosquitoes. 



The taxpayers who underwrote the eight-thousand-dollar con- 

 tract for $250' each regarded the matter as cheap at the price, 

 but, to wake up the first year after the ditches had been dug and 

 to realize before the summer was over that there had been no 

 particular improvement in conditions, was discouraging, to say 

 the least, and engendered more or less criticism. 



With the above facts in view, the Commission, from January 

 1st, 19 1 6, has decided to take over the area covered by the Little 

 Silver contract, including it in the general work of the Commis- 

 sion. It is the hope and expectation of the members of the Com- 

 mission, and property owners as well, that when the summer of 



1 91 6 is over there will be another story to tell, and that, if the 

 proposition is not proven already, it will be satisfactorily demon-^ 

 strated that salt-marsh mosquito extermination can be taken up 

 and pursued with better results under the Commission's guidance 

 than by private control. 



