To ensure sufficient lighting every liv- | cities lot and block overcrowding are ing room must have a window opening often serious, there are thousands of upon a street or yard, or upon a court dark rooms and halls, great numbers not less than ten feet wide. According of cellars and basements utterly unfit to the latest housing law (the Massachusetts City Tenement House Act) the for habitation are still occupied, there height of a dwelling cannot exceed one is a vast amount of defective plumbstory for each clear ten feet of the width ing and general dilapidation, and rareof the street upon which the dwelling ly does a board of health have funds fronts. The back yard must be at least enough to supervise adequately the 15 feet in depth for a three-story building. Back yards usually abut each other, dwellings which ought to be constantso a three-story dwelling, for example, ly visited. But public sentiment rewill have at least 30 feet of open space specting these matters is improving. at both front and rear. If the building is Here and there all over the country rightly placed the rooms even on the there is progress; buildings unfit for ground floor will always be fairly well habitation are being condemned, and lighted. If the height of the building is higher standards are being applied to old dwellings. increased the depth of the yard must also be increased so as to preserve the proper relations between height and yard space. To secure adequate ventilation not only should every room be lighted from the street or yard or a large court, but the area of the windows between stop beads should be not less than one seventh of the floor area, and the sashes should be made to open full width. Good sanitation means that the occupancy of cellars for living purposes should be forbidden, and that basements should not be so occupied unless they meet the requirements for lighting and ventilation and are made damp-proof; that every apartment should have its own toilet, or if there are apartments of one and two rooms that there should be one water-closet for every two apartments, and all properly constructed and lighted; that every apartment should have a sink, and that both sink and closet should be supplied with plenty of running water. Boston. A bill is before the legislature of Massachusetts forbidding absolutely the occupancy of cellars for living purposes in the city of Boston, and making the requirements for basement occupancy the same for old buildings as for new. This bill is supported by the city government. New York. The New York City Commission on Congestion of Population made a report to the Mayor and the Board of Aldermen in March, 1911, and the life of the commission then expired (A. Y. B., 1911, 244-8). The New York Congestion Committee (Dr. Benjamin C. Marsh, secretary, 320 Broadway) has taken up several of the recommendations of the Commission, and has tried to secure the desired legislation. measures are: (1) Limitation on size Protection against fire demands two of buildings and the establishing of entirely separate means of egress from zones or districts, with different reguevery apartment, one of which must be lations, as to heights and size of buildfireproof. To secure a measure of pri-ings in New York City, a matter which vacy there should be an entrance to the city administration has now taken every bedroom and at least to one toilet up. (2) Partial untaxing of buildwithout passing through another bed room. board of health. Among these To prevent overcrowding not lessings: the Committee is now trying to than 400 cu. ft. (500 is better) of air secure almost complete untaxing of space in bedrooms should be required for buildings, reducing the tax rate on each adult, and no family should be al- buildings to one per cent. of that on lowed to take lodgers or boarders except land; the reason for leaving the slight upon the written permission of the tax on buildings is the provision limiting the borrowing capacity of the city to ten per cent. of the assessed value of real estate "subject to taxation;" total exemption of buildings from taxation would invalidate about $290,000,000 of the city debt. (3) Mothers' pensions: the Commission recommends public assistance for widows, which has been fought by private charities successfully. (4) Va The above requirements, amplified of course, are quite generally coming to be recognized, according to Dr. Nolen, as the standard minima for new buildings. It is also desired to make them so far as possible the minimum requirements for the improvement of old buildings, but here there are great difficulties in the way. In the older cating of dark rooms; this has been | is improved, or if they drag down the defeated annually. neighborhoods to which they move. Such follow-up work will in course of time give us knowledge of great value in social work. Philadelphia. The Pennsylvania Supreme Court has rendered a decision which modifies the operation of a law designed to improve Philadel phia's housing conditions, passed in 1913 (A. Y. B., 1913, p. 219), which discontinued the three divisions of drainage, nuisance and tenement-house inspection in the Bureau of Health and established in place of them one division, the Division of Housing and Sanitation. This law was promoted by the Philadelphia Housing Commission and had the approval of the city administration. It did not have the approval of the city councils, however, and they refused to make any appropriation for the new division while continuing the appropriations for the three old divisions. The question was taken into the courts and appealed to the Supreme Court, which decided that the law was defective in several particulars and that in any event the initiative of putting it into effect rested with the councils, not with the administration. Therefore, as the councils had appropriated money for the old divisions and none for the new, the old divisions were in existence and the new one was not. Another court decision in Pennsylvania has caused concern. Under the act of 1913 (A. Y. B., 1913, p. 216) Chester adopted a city-planning commission. Two builders in Chester applied to the city building inspector for a permit to erect 14 houses. They were refused on the ground that the proposed layout was not in accordance with the building law. The case was taken into court and Judge Broomall of Delaware County decided that the city-planning commission has no jurisdiction to approve or disapprove of such operations and no power or authority in connection therewith, and that the action of the commission disapproving of the said operation was of no effect. The court of Blair County have followed this decision. Cleveland. Cleveland's authorities have ordered about 300 houses razed. Cleveland is not content simply to pull down old dwellings; it purposes to find out where their inhabitants go -if to better quarters, if they pay more rent, if their standard of living Housing and Town Planning.-The American Academy of Political and Social Science devoted the January, 1914, issue of the Annals to a comprehensive and useful collection of papers edited by Dr. C. Aronovici. The volume brings out clearly the sharp difference which exists between two schools of housing reformers now in the field. One of these emphasizes reform through legislation, and the great progress that has been made in New York City under the Tenement House Act of 1901 makes this reliance upon legislation seem reasonable. The other school holds that a broader social and economic policy which recognizes the relation between housing and transportation, revised methods of taxation, and organized effort to improve standards of living will accomplish much more than regulative legislation. The National Municipal Review for July, 1914, contained an article on the financial side of the problem. The Billerica Garden Suburbs. Massachusetts Homestead Commission is to establish the first copartnership housing experiment in the United States, and its first garden suburb embodying all the English ideals-site planning, limited number of houses per acre, wholesale operation, limited dividend and participation by the residents. During the year the Commission has outlined plans designed to adapt this method of financing wage-earners' dwellings to American conditions. Meanwhile it has sought opportunity to give these plans practical application. Of four sites under consideration that at North Billerica, 27 miles from Boston, seemed to offer the greatest advantages. There the Boston and Maine Railroad established its repair shops early in the year, at once creating a demand for good dwellings. As these shops have already brought 1,200 operatives to the little community and will ultimately add 10,000 or more to its population, there is an opportunity for doing a good piece of constructive work. The project has the approval and backing of officials of the shops, who desire, as much as do the workmen, to secure good living conditions. Land is still cheap, though much of it has been exploited and is no longer held at prices attractive to the workmen. (See also XXX, Architecture, and Landscape Architecture.) National Housing Conference.—The fourth National Housing Conference was to have been held at Minneapolis, Oct. 21-23, but was postponed on account of the war. The secretaries of the Association are Lawrence Veiller and John Ihlder, 105 East 22d Street, New York. FIRE PREVENTION National Fire Protection Association. The National Fire Protection Association inaugurated a new plan of work during the year calculated to extend its influence and greatly increase the effectiveness of its efforts. Local chapters of the Association have | been established in the cities of Boston, New York, Pittsburgh, Chicago, Montreal, Winnipeg and Los Angeles, whose purpose it is to secure local application and enforcement of the Association's standards. speed with which motor apparatus arrived, in some cases only 15 or 20 minutes after the call for help was received, and the considerably longer period which was required by such horse apparatus as responded, would appear to demonstrate the superiority of motor apparatus for prompt long distance speeding to fires. trict to maintain their fire departments at a given standard and to maintain a suitable place for the dis Massachusetts Fire Hazard Commission. The Massachusetts Fire Hazard Commission made its report in January, recommending a permaBuilding Laws.-The Association nent metropolitan fire-hazard commiscompleted during the year a model sion which shall have power to combuilding code for small municipalities pel all cities within the Boston diswhich is calculated to exercise a wide influence upon the building construction of the country outside of the large cities. Public efforts to estab-posal of inflammable refuse, and the lish legal limits for building heights in the cities of the country are increasingly successful, New York City itself, the greatest offender in this regard, having established a Heights of Buildings Commission to give consideration to this important subject (see City Planning, supra). The Salem, Mass., conflagration lent desirable emphasis to the hazard of the wooden shingle, and a number of cities may legislate against this conflagrationbreeder before the influence of the Salem disaster is dissipated. The Salem Fire.-Salem was almost completely destroyed by fire on June 25. Of the population of 44,000, 20,000 were made homeless, 9,000 were thrown out of work, and $15,000,000 worth of property was destroyed. The conflagration illustrated the hazard of a city of wooden houses, and that Salem has learned its lesson is indicated by the regulations established for rebuilding (see City Planning, supra). An interesting phase of the fire was the fact that almost every town within a radius of 20 miles sent apparatus to the assistance of Salem, and the power also to maintain a staff of inspectors for the inspection of premises to see that the rules and regulations of the commission and the law creating the commission are obeyed. It lays stress on the desirability of legislation regulating the construction of buildings and the establishment of fire limits according to the fitness of the boundaries instead of an arbitrary selection of certain streets as the outer limits. It would encourage the formation of fire-proof building barriers in the principal districts that conflagration might be arrested by them. The commission recommends a law to prohibit the use of the shingle roof, a law providing that all upright supports below the first floor of a building shall be made of incombustible material, a law limiting the height and increasing the distance between certain kinds of buildings, and a law providing that all smoke and vent pipes for stoves, furnaces and heaters, including gas stoves, shall be protected. Fire Losses. According to a statement issued by the National Board of Fire Underwriters, the per capita fire The inclusion 1. The encouragement of fire-resistive building construction through the adoption of improved building codes by all in such codes of adequate rules for exit facilities based on the occupancy for all buildings. states, cities and towns. 2. The adoption of laws or ordinances requiring the installation of automatic sprinkler systems as fire-extinguishing agents in all factories, commercial estabThe adoption of ordinances requiring the construction of fire division walls, not only as a property-protecting device, but as providing the best life-saving exit facility. lishments and city blocks. 3. The establishment by law of a fire marshal in every state, who shall be a trained man with trained assistants com petent to direct the work as statistician, educator and prosecutor. 4. The investigation of the causes of all fires by public officials. loss in the United States has shown a gradual increase during the past 30 years, and is unreasonably in excess of that in European countries. For the six years from 1907 to 1912, inclusive, the fire loss in the United States averaged $210,000,000 annually and exceeded that figure in all but two of these years; the loss in the corresponding period of ten years earlier, 1897 to 1902, averaged $148,000,000, and in none of these years exceeded $166,000,000. Between the two periods occurred the conflagrations in Baltimore and San Francisco, with losses of $50,000,000 and $350,000,000, respectively. The loss per capita in the United States in 1910 was $2.33, as against $2.10 in 1900 and $1.50 in 1880. The figures for 300 cities in the United States, having a total estimated population of 20,000,000 or over, 5. The consolidation of all legal forces show a per capita loss in 1912 of so as to provide for the systematic in$2.55; the per capita loss in 1912 in spection of all buildings by local fire45 European cities averaged 49 cents, men and technically trained building and and ranged in the various countries factory inspectors so as to insure the from four cents to 90 cents. The seri-liness, good housekeeping and the mainvigorous enforcement of rules for cleanousness of the conflagration danger in American cities is realized by business men generally, and the National Board of Fire Underwriters is striving to reduce the evil by urging adequate water supply with improved systems of distribution, efficient organization and modern equipment of fire departments, and adoption of building codes providing for improved and safe methods of construction. It is doubtful, however, if the year 1914 will show any reduction in the aggre gate of fire loss, but this is because of certain large sweeping fires. There is no doubt that fire hazards are slowly being eliminated by better building construction, and the number of alarms reduced by better housekeeping and more efficient inspections. (See also XIV, Property and Casualty Insurance.) Prevention Standards.-The National Fire Protection Association at its annual meeting, besides the usual voluminous committee reports on the standards of the Association, which are progressively revised and amended each year, adopted the following resolutions, which may be taken as illustrating the progress of fire prevention and the standards set up during the year: tenance of safe and unobstructed exits, fire-fighting apparatus and other protective devices. 6. The especial safeguarding of schools, theaters, factories and all other places in which numbers of people con gregate or are employed. 7. The vigorous state and municipal regulation of the transportation, storage and use of all inflammable liquids and explosives. 8. A careful study of municipal water supplies, their adequacy and reliability, in case of conflagration. with special reference to their adequacy 9. The universal adoption and use of the safety match. 10. The education of children and the public generally in careful habits regarding the use of fire. Perhaps the most important publication which was completed during the year was that on Field Practice, which is practically a manual for the use of field men, property owners, fire departments and inspection bureaus. The inauguration of inspection service by the fire departments in all large cities of the country had made an imperative demand for a handbook that should both guide and educate the new inspectors. This book does not set out the standards of the Association, which are already published and pro mulgated by the National Board of tion Association, has been mainly Fire Underwriters as its official stand-along the lines of increased reliabilards; but aims to point out the com- ity. Service records have naturally mon diseases or defects of fire equip- brought out some faults of design, ments, in order that the inspector may recognize at once the fact if it is out of order. Fire Marshals.-The Indiana legislature at its latest session passed a state fire-marshal law patterned closely after the model law proposed by the Fire Marshals' Association and the National Board of Fire Underwriters. The Kansas legislature created the office of state fire marshal at the 1913 session. The law is devoted chiefly to the procedure to be followed in the investigation of incendiary fires and is very weak in that section relating to the correction of physical hazards. The only specific grant of power is that giving the marshal authority to remove or remedy hazards caused by the presence of combustibles. and have indicated that in some cases materials and devices not well suited to the purpose have been employed; most of the manufacturers are anxious to discover and correct these weak points, taking advantage of the experience gained in service and at tests. A most instructive series of tests was conducted during the convention of the International Association of Fire Engineers, in New York, in September, 1913. Eleven automobile pumping engines of eight different makes were entered for these tests, which extended over a period of 12 hours; six hours pumping at 120 lb. net pump pressure and three hours each at 200 and 200 lb. net pressure, with only such intervals between as were necessary for changes in hose and nozzles. Three of the 11 machines Fire Apparatus.-Development of completed the 12-hour run without inautomobile fire apparatus during the terruption; there were a number of year, according to a report of a com- interruptions due to loose bolts or mittee of the National Fire Protec-broken parts. POLICE a New York. There has been marked improvement in the enforcement of the law in New York under the administration of Police Commissioner Arthur Woods. A strenuous effort has been made by the Mitchel administration to secure the repeal of the laws providing for a court review of the removal of police officials. In the opinion of Mayor Mitchel the revocation of the law granting a court review to police officials was not the denial of a right, but the withdrawal of a privilege granted by the community at a time when that privilege, with its corresponding security of tenure, was deemed to be in the public interest. Notwithstanding the strong effort made to secure the passage of the mayor's bills, popularly known as the "Goethals bills" because they were the conditions upon which Colonel Goethals would consider the acceptance of the police commissionership, they were defeated in the legislature. A comprehensive descriptive and critical report of the police pension fund of New York was prepared by the New York Bureau of Municipal Research for the aldermanic investigating committee; it has been published in book form. Police Commissioner Woods has established in the busiest precinct of the city a system of signal lamps, each of which is connected with the station house of the precinct on an independent electric current. One of the lamps is located on the beat of each patrolman and the lieutenant at his desk can call the patrolman on post on any beat to the telephone for orders. Chicago. The work of the Civil Service Commission in connection with the police department during the early part of 1914 consisted in the efficiency division working with council committees and with the department in securing an appropriation for new police stations and the redistricting of the city. This followed a painstaking inspection of all police stations and a study of the police needs of the various parts of the city and the necessary rearrangement of district lines that had remained the |