Construction to the value of probably between $50,000 and $60,000 was authorized by building permits issued during the year by the city building inspector.
It may as well be admitted, however, that the foregoing figures are pure guess work, no record of the valuation of the buildings erecting having been kept prior to October 1, 1923.
However, the records are clear as to the kind of building covered by each permit, and, basing the valuation on the average cost of the kind of building specified, the foregoing figures are arrived at. The outstanding building achievement of the year is, of course, the completion of the new high school building, at a cost of $250,000; but this building was begun prior to 1923 and does not figure in the building permits issued that year.
Home building led all other building activities in Elizabeth City during 1923, the number of dwelling houses erected during the year being 63. This does not include additions to residences in the way of kitchens and outhouses.
Next in order numerically were garages, of which there were 29, including both public and private garages.
It has been an off year in business building for the city, but Water street, as for the last several years, has seen some building activity. Notable among the new buildings on this street is that being erected by N.G. Grandy & Co. just south of the State bridge across the Pasquotank river, to be occupied by the Tidewater Buick Company and others, with a valuation probably of around $10,000 and $12,000. Then the Auto & Gas Engine Works is building an addition to its building, increasing the frontage on Water street from 60 feet to 80 feet, at a cost of approximately $3,000. Farther north on Water, W.J. Woodley, wholesale grocer, is completing an addition to his building on Burgess, which will increase his floor space by about 6,000 feet and will cost approximately $3,000. Finally, the Globe Fish Company just occupied its new quarters of brick construction and erected at a cost to make a broad guess at something like $5,000.
However, both the Woodley warehouse and the Globe Fish Company building are not covered by the building permits issued for 1923, as each was begun in the fall of 1922.
Other classes of buildings for which permits were issued were: Stables, 9; apartment house, 1; filling stations, 2; combination dwelling house and store, 2; church, 2; store rooms, 9; shops, 1; s stores, 2; shed, 1; hen house, 1; kitchens, 2; wood houses, 5; factories, 2; office, 1, washroom, 1.
Paving has been practically at a standstill in Elizabeth City for the last several years, due to the uncertainty as to the outcome of the effort on the part of the city to establish municipally owned public utilities. It is held by the city authorities that it would be the height of folly to spend large sums of money on costly street paving that might have to be torn up in a year or two for the laying of sewer and water mains.
Two years ago, more or less, the city issued bonds in the amount of $800,000 with which to build its own utilities. It offered the existing private corporations now supplying the city with water, light, power and sewerage a quarter of a million dollars for their properties. The utility companies refused that offer but intimated that they would sell for around $325,000. A deadlock ensued and when there appeared no prospect of the deadlock’s being broken, the city authorities proceeded to institute steps to erect municipally owned and operated utility plants in competition with the privately owned properties. Then it was that the private corporations controlling the city’s utilities stepped in and by a series of injunctions threw the fight into the courts.
There it has remained ever since. At every pitched battle, the city comes out the victor; but the corporations take an appeal and so tedious are the processes of the law in such matters that to many members of the precent city administration final settlement seems farther away than it ever did. A recent vote of the City Council disclosed that half of the members of that body are favorably disposed to re-opening negotiations for the purchase of the privately owned utilities now serving the city.
Even sidewalk paving has been limited; something less than a mile having been put down during the entire year. The paving of sidewalks on the North and South sides of Fearing street from Dyer to Persse was the principal sidewalk project of the year.
From the front page of The Daily Advance, Elizabeth City, N.C., Jan. 1, 1924
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