Page:American Journal of Sociology Volume 9.djvu/499

 A MODEL MUNICIPAL DEPARTMENT 481

may be ordered out at night on a so-called " over-crowding raid," where it is necessary to make a night inspection of certain doubtful tenements and report as to whether there are more boarders sleeping in a single room than the Sanitary Code allows.

Often, too, the members of the Sanitary Squad are sent out by their commanding sergeant to enforce the municipal ordinance against spitting in cars and other public places. These special raids are good tests of the efficiency and alertness of the men, and rarely does a single policeman return without having made an arrest in which the magistrate will uphold him. Thus, on February 4, 1903, forty "Health Squad" men arrested thirty- nine persons with the following results :

Fined $i, $2. $3. Discharged. Held for Trial.

15 15 2 6 i

Contrast this with the results secured by the regular policemen on the day previous (February 3, 1903, when 125 regular men were detailed from police headquarters to enforce the spitting law, and between them made only twenty-nine arrests, of which two-thirds were discharged by the magistrates. Indeed, as I have said, one needs but to accompany the sanitary police on their daily rounds to observe that they are an able body of high- toned men.

Inspectors of foods and offensive trades. Besides the regular sanitary men there are the inspectors of foods and offensive trades. Among the most important of these are the milk inspect- ors. It is their duty from time to time, or as often as possible and as occasion demands, to test all milk sold in the city of New York, and where the same falls below the proper standard to report the facts to the Board of Health and recommend that the permit of the seller be revoked. For not only must every milk dealer have a license permitting him to sell at retail, but the department also compels all wholesale dealers, and back of them the dairymen, to obtain permits. 1 And no permit is issued

'Sanitary Code, sec. 66. On May 2, 1902, the following notice was issued to inspectors in regard to the granting of milk permits : " On and after this date .... make one inspection on receipt of the application to sell milk. If conditions are