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this Colony, provided of course that at the land sales this condition is inade clear to intending purchasers who would then acquire their sites with their eyes open to the requirements of the new law. With this view a By-Law has been added in- tended to apply to future extensions of the town.
9. As the City of Victoria has been built on a strongly marked declivity, the houses rising in terraces or steps one above the other, have had to have their foundations excavated out of the steep hillside, and in many cases the back walls of the basement stories have been built in juxtaposition with the earth or with scarp walls that have been thrown up in order to retain the hillside in place. In some instances these retaining walls themselves are found to form the back wall of the house. Such basement floors being many feet below the surface of the ground outside are it is needless to add extremely damp, and during the rainy season the moisture is in some instances even found to percolate through the walls. They are also as a rule so dark that the inmates are compelled to burn lights even at noon-day. Unquestionably basement dwellings under these conditions are not fit for human habitation, and as no sanitary authority could possibly countenance their perpetuation in houses to be newly built or reconstructed, the Board have provided in the Bill that in new buildings or reconstructions a clear intervening space of four feet open to the sky shall be left between the hillside and the house.
10. For the purposes of adequate ventilation and for the arrest of damp, sonarrow a space as four feet might not perhaps be deemed sufficient by a rigid sanitarian, but again in the consideration of this question the same difficulty which beset that of the minimum width of back-yards stepped in, and in view of the undue sacrifice of property that would have attended the adoption of a wider space, the Board after careful deliberation were constrained to adopt as narrow a margin as four feet for the minimum width of clear area to be left between the house walls and the hillside.
11. The next question that came under consideration was whether such land- lords as would be debarred hereafter from building or reconstructing their houses against the hillside, that is to say such landlords as contemplated the perpetuation of dwellings manifestly unfit for human habitation, should be compensated for the loss of area involved in the new rule, and before arriving at a final decision on this point the Board caused an examination of the City to be made with a view to ascertaining the number of houses actually built against the hillside, and the aggregate area which would eventually have to be relinquished if all such houses when their time for reconstruction arrived, were to be set back, four feet.
12. The examination revealed the fact that in Victoria there were a large number of houses so circumstanced, that the area to be relinquished would be 118,642 square feet, and that the compensation to the owners for such relinquish- ment assessed at current leasehold estate values would come to $791,096.
13. After protracted deliberation the Board have arrived at the decision that the question of compensation for loss of area was one that must be left for settlement to the Executive Government, and the Board therefore desire to limit themselves to the recommendation that whatever policy or line of action has been followed at home of late years in the improvements of the dwellings of the people should be observed in this Colony, and they tender this advice confident that in following the footsteps of English Municipalities no injustice will accrue to vested interests.
14. The Board find from the Returns prepared for them at the Land Office by the courtesy of Mr. BRUCE SHEPHERD that there are about 2,200 landlords, of whom one third are either European permanent absentees or natives resident on the mainland of China, who have invested their money in Hongkong building operations for the purposes of personal profit but who have not otherwise the same direct interest in the maintenance of the health of the community as the regular inhabi- tants of Victoria.
15. I am to transmit you the enclosed protest against the Bill from the pen of Dr. Ho KAI a member of the Board.
I have the honour to be,
Sir,
Your most obedient Servant,
HUGH MCCALLUM, Secretary.
The Honourable F. STEWART, LL.D.,
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Acting Colonial Secretary.