The Tangled Web of Tacoma’s Water Scandal
Public confidence in Tacoma city finances erodes as taxpayers learn the treasurer's bondsmen are heavily linked to failed banks and dubious deals.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
The most dangerous effect of the current situation is the unrest manifested by capital. A banker says: 'There are millions of dollars in the East ready for and seeking investment, but I cannot consistently advise any of it coming here until things change. Capital has been fooled too often in the middle West to come here without first finding a safe resting place.' In the main, the slump in the price of warrants results from the purchase of the water plant, as has been proved, at over twice its value, and the further fact that a gravity system cannot be had. Many taxpayers would like very much to know where City Treasurer Boggs keeps his cash. Mr. Boggs has held it an injustice to banks having no deposits to publish those having it. He refers to his bond, and says it ought to satisfy the people. The bond, about which there has been so much talk, is in the sum of $500,000, but many of the signers are officers of suspended institutions or bank directors.
“The city is all right, and will meet every dollar of its obligations, but considerable time will be required, and meantime not a little individual hardship must be endured.”
This 1893 report captures a classic Pacific Northwest struggle: the tension between local boosterism and the reality of civic corruption. When public officials and private banks are tied together by complex bonds and missing money, the cost of living—then in the form of devalued city warrants—is passed directly to the working people.
From readers
No comments yet. If you know something about this story — a correction, a family memory, a source — it belongs here.