The City of Experts

The experts on the county's books are still at work on an unlimited contract at the rate of $15 a day. They have been employed continuously since last April, and there is no sign that they intend to quit soon. Their pay has now run up to about $2700 and it will amount to about $4500 by the end of the year. There have been rumors of big disclosures of crookedness, but when these rumors have been run down it was found that nothing but a few trivial clerical errors had been found. As a matter of fact, there are expert accountants in Walla Walla who could have been engaged at a fraction of the cost to do the work in two months. This county, as well as the city of Walla Walla, is getting an overdose of experts. Recently, the city paid a man of no reputation $500 for the information that there is an abundance of water in Mill Creek and that the water runs downhill. Later, a journeyman blacksmith from the East was engaged to teach the veteran firemen how to handle their apparatus. It is a little tough on the taxpayers to be under the necessity of paying for them in every department of city and county government.