Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 40.djvu/633

Rh more miles of sewers than of streets. In 190 cities the population to each mile of sewer is 1,815.

The social statistics of cities already published comprehend tables on the points which have been discussed; and, further, as stated, on the police and fire departments. In the latter two sections the chief interest relates to the cost of each force. Selecting some of the salient features relative to the police, it is interesting to learn that in New York there are 72·65 patrolmen to each square mile of territory, while in Chicago there are but 9·08, in Philadelphia 11·01, in Brooklyn 34·01, in St. Louis 8·72, in Boston 19·25, in Baltimore 21·81, in San Francisco 21·73, in Cincinnati 16, in Cleveland 10·13, in New Orleans 4·66, and in Washington 35·64.

The criminal conditions as indicated by arrests, if arrests be a fair indication, are shown by the following facts: In New York the number of arrests to each patrolman is 25·53, in Chicago 27·37, in Philadelphia 35·09, in Brooklyn 31·52, in St. Louis 32·98, in Boston 48·41, in Baltimore 42·96, in San Francisco 69·68, in Cincinnati 35, in Cleveland 29·76, in Buffalo 41, in New Orleans 86·71, and in Washington 48·71.

The question as to what a man receives for the taxes he is called upon to pay is not only an exceedingly interesting one from an economic point of view, but of real, vital consequence to the welfare of the people. I have therefore constructed an entirely new table from the various tables already reported by the census, showing the average cost per head of population in the fifty cities named for the construction and repairs of streets, for street-cleaning, for lamps of all kinds, for the maintenance and repairs of sewers, for the police force, for the fire department, and for water, with a total which all these items of expenditure make for each inhabitant in the fifty cities named. (See table on following page.)

The averages in the tables from which the foregoing is drawn are, as I understand it, for the ten years ending January 1, 1890, except in some cases where municipal governments have been of recent growth, in which cases the averages are for the years during which the work has been carried on. It is evident, however, that the averages have been very carefully worked out, and represent more forcibly than any statements heretofore published the cost in the great branches of city government in the cities named. I hope in some future paper to add the cost of the educational work of the cities, and some other features, so as to show the exact expenditures which one has to make for the maintenance of the various branches of city affairs. It must be remembered that the average cost per head of population, as shown in the last table, represents the cost to each man, woman, and child. It must also be remembered that the cost is not paid directly, in