Rensselaer Semi-Weekly Republican, Volume 34, Number 76, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 23 May 1902 — GRATIFYING COMPARISONS [ARTICLE]

GRATIFYING COMPARISONS

The progress which Indiana is mak- ! ing in the economy of managing its charitable and correctional institutions may be noted in part' by comparing the statistics presented by the bulletin issued by the board of "state clarities at th<r- close of fiscal years considerably wide apart in point of time. The number giving the statistics of expenditure during the year ending Oct. 31, 1901, was published last week, thus affording a comparison of some items of cost and financial statistics with those of the fiscal year which ended Oct. 31, 1891. Take the hospitals for the insane: The average cost of maintenance per capita during the year which ended Oct. 31, 1891 was 1227.38, while the same for the fiscal year ending Oct. 31, 1901, was $173.87 —a decrease in 10 years of $53.51. This marked decrease cannot be attributed to a lower range of prices during the year 1901 than prevailed 10 years earlier, since for many lines of goods consumed by such Institutions the" market prices were higher during 1901; If it had cost as much per capita during the fiscal year which closed last October to support the inmates of the insane asylums as it did ten years earlier the bills would have been $193,010.57 more than they were. It need not be observed that $193,010.57 is a good lot of money to save in the expenses of one series of institutions.

The average per capita cost of maintaining the Soldiers’ and Sailors’ Orphans’ Home, the Institution for the Deaf, the Institution for the Blind and the School for the Feeble-minded during the fiscal year which ended Oct. 31, 1891, was $222.79. The State Soldiers’ Home has been added since but the per capita cost of the maintenance of all these institutions for the fiscal year ending Oct. 31, 1901, was $174.33 —a decrease during the decade of $48.46 per capita. If the cost per capita of maintaining the wards of the state in these institutions had been

as much per capita last year as ten years ago, the whole' number, 2,446, would have cost the taxpayers sllß,343.16 more than it did. The state has four correctional institutions. One of the prisons has been changed into a reformatory, which requires more expensive methods. During the year ended Oct. 31, 1891, the average cost of the maintenance of the inmates of the correctional Institutions was $134.75 per capita. The figures for last year have ~not been so carried out that a comparison can be made with accuracy, but the per capita cost during it was less than that ten years earlier. A saving of $311,353 in the expenses of two classes of institutions during a year, which had 5,849 inmates, is an achievement which is cause for congratulation to all who have had a hand in the work, and not the least by those legislators who gave to the management of the state’s institutions business methods for party favoritism.

Governors Mount and Dprbln placed able men of both parties on the boards of these institutions, land, with other state officers, new laws into effect both in letter and spirit. To the state board of charities and their secretary, Mr. Butler, too much credit cannot be given for the small part of their achievements which the figures here used present.—lndianapolis Journal.