Newport Bought Its Fire Hydrants — Then Never Had Them Installed
The town paid for fire plugs in September, but the council never ordered the water company to set them. Now the work can't be done until spring — and the paper is warning that the town may pay for the delay.
Away back in September a lot of fire plugs arrived that were ordered by the city and paid for, and were supposed to assist in giving Newport needed fire protection this winter. However, the council failed to order the water company to install them, and the work cannot now be done until spring. The town may consider itself mighty lucky if it does not seriously feel the want of these fire plugs before spring.
“The town may consider itself mighty lucky if it does not seriously feel the want of these fire plugs before spring.”
A town that pays for fire protection but never installs it is a small, familiar civic failure: purchase without follow-through, and deferred maintenance that only matters when the emergency comes. More than a century later, Newport and small towns everywhere still wrestle with the gap between buying equipment and keeping basic services actually working.
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