That acting within the discretion thus vested in them your memoralists have erected a Vestry Hall, which is suitable in every respect for the purposes of your memorialists, and for the before-mentioned public concerns of the inhabitants.
That as evidence that the large room was much required in this parish, and is fully appreciated by the inhabitants, your memorialists do state that since its opening on the 30th November last, seventy meetings of various kinds have taken place therein, which may be thus classified:—Religious and Moral, twenty-seven; Intellectual, twenty; Social, Political, and to encourage the Volunteer movement, twenty-three.
That for nineteen of these meetings the use of the room has been given absolutely without charge, and for the others a scale of payment has been arranged by your Memorialists, which is in their opinion equitable and fair—and which has been submitted to your Finance Committee.
That the building erected by your Memorialists is plain and substantial in its character; the plan of it having been submitted to, and approved by, your Honourable Board before it was commenced, (which original plan has not been departed from in any substantial particular) and will cost (excluding the cost of the site) the, not unreasonable, sum of Seven Thousand pounds; being the original contract sum of £5630, and the remainder for extra and additional works, which your Memorialists fear are inevitable in all such undertakings.
That particulars in full detail of the estimated cost of the site, building, fittings, furniture and sundries, have been laid before your Finance Committee, by your Memorialists, amounting in the whole to about, £12,000.
That your Memorialists are of opinion that the most equitable manner of defraying the said expenses both for the present and future Ratepayers is by means of a loan, repayable with interest in twenty years, thus rendering the sanction of your Honorable Board requisite.
That the Large Hall is intended to be used for purposes of the Vestry, and in fact is now about to be so used for the election of Vestrymen under the Act.
That although a portion of the premises is now temporarily made use of as Reading Rooms, as stated in the letter of your Memorialists to your Finance Committee, those rooms will most probably be required for the Gas Examiner under the Metropolis Gas Act, and the analyst under the Act for the Prevention of the Adulteration of Food and Drink of last session.