The robbery of a child upon the park has been reported and complaint is made of the inadequacy of the police force. Names and obscene words are frequently found of late cut or marked on the structures of the park and the offenders are seldom detected. At the same time the keepers consider themselves overtasked and there is no doubt that the service required of them is more fatiguing than that of the Metropolitan police force, whose pay s considerably greater than theirs. There is no ground of complaint, however, against the keepers individually; as a rule they perform their duty zealously. The system of inspection is such that habitual carelessness, neglect or inactivity can not occur without detection and consequent dismissal. I think this is now well understood in the force.

It remains for the Board to judge whether the force is directed advantageously or whether it is inadequate in number for its purpose.

The number of persons visiting the park is many times greater in the afternoon, and especially in the latter part of the afternoon, than in the morning. Many times greater on Saturday than on other working days, and double on Sunday what it is on Saturday. The proportion of careless and evil-disposed persons is greater when a larger number of persons are on the park than when the visitors are few. For this reason the number of keepers kept on active duty in the morning is very small in order that the largest possible force may be thrown out [281] in the afternoon and evening. During six hours in the forenoon, two men patrol the lower park; during six hours in the afternoon, twenty-two. A reserve for special duty of those not on patrol is constantly at the station house. The remaining ten men of the force are on the park during 12 hours of the night, the whole being on active duty most of the time, but each man getting from 2 to 4 hours rest between 12 and 4 o’clock. On rainy days the period of out-of-door duty of those coming on duty in the afternoon is lessened. During the skating season the whole system is necessarily changed. When the ice was most frequented, a large proportion of the men were last year required to be on their feet from 12 to 18 hours a day. On Sunday, men selected from the foremen of the working force are employed as a re-inforcement of the regular police.

Some deductions from the force above indicated always occur on account of absences. Leave of absence with pay is never given; leave of absence without pay, seldom, except on account of illness or death in the family of the applicant. Absence without leave is a matter of discipline. Absence on account of illness, or injury even when the injury has been incurred on duty, involves loss of pay. Nevertheless, from two to seven men daily fail to appear at roll call. In fine summer weather the average number absent is two; in the autumn, five; in winter somewhat more. The usual causes of [the] above are footsoreness and intermittent fever. The real force employed is thus more than seven per cent below that authorized by the board, and this appears by the pay rolls.

In the morning, there is but one patrolman for fifty acres of the lower park, or one to a mile and a half of the completed walks and drives. During the afternoon, one to 30 acres of the completed ground, exclusive of the Ramble; one to 8 acres in the Ramble, or one to each three-fourths of a mile of the drives and walks in use. The upper part of the park is not patrolled, but is incidentally inspected at frequent intervals by keepers and especially by the officers when returning from duty below, or by special details drawn from the reserve at the station when the active duty is not severe. The disproportionate force distributed during certain hours of the afternoon is required by the distraction and interruption to systematic watchfulness of each patrolman, occasioned by the constant enquiries made and the cautions and directions needed by those who visit the park at that time. It would be very unfortunate if the great body of visitors should notice the rarity with which the guardians of order, decency and personal safety were seen, and [if] the impression should thus be gained that a very inadequate police was maintained on the park. It is my constant endeavor by all means in my power to secure a contrary reputation for the park.

The wanton defacement of the various structures to which I have referred occurs chiefly, I believe, on Sundays and holidays and can only be prevented by the almost constant attendance of a man at each point on those days. Owing to the leaning and handling of dirty and sweaty persons, tobacco-spitting, the deposit of broken fruit, and waste of all sorts of eatables and other filthy practices, voluntary or otherwise, the summer houses, seats, balustrades [and] [282] balconies of the bridges are frequently forbidding to cleanly persons, who are thus deprived of what they deem their rights upon the park. These structures should be cleaned thoroughly every morning, and should be visited for the same purpose once or twice during the day. Water closets and urinals and the walks leading to them, of which there will soon be several established in the park, will especially need a service which could not be altogether well performed by the regular keepers consistently with their other duty. Nor can this class of duties be well and consistently attended to by the officers of the working force. They are properly included in the public duties of the park.

Besides the park keepers, there are at present 12 gate keepers. A petition of the gate keepers recently handed me accompanies this communication. It was composed by one of their number, and the simple statement of facts which it presents is worthy of the attention of the Board. The duties of the gate-keepers, at first very easy, are now important and demand, especially at certain gates, but little less exercise of good judgment than those of the park-keepers. The gate keepers are at present required to be at their posts from 11 to 12 hours together every day, including Sundays. This is more than it is right under ordinary circumstances to demand of any men. The entrances to the park should, however, be watched during all the time the public are allowed or expected to visit it, which according to a vote of the Commission will hereafter be from 15 to 18 hours a day. The ordinances of the Commission can not be enforced unless the gates are attended by two sets of men, one relieving the other. That men at all fit for the duty required of the gate keepers can be hired at 90 cents a day can only be accounted for on the ground that in this city there are always those so driven by extremity of destitution, that after long experience of disappointment they are willing to undertake any duty offered them at any rate of compensation. I feel obliged at present to make the demand upon the gate-keepers as light as the necessities of the park will admit of. It would obviously be better if the duty of the gate keepers could be performed by the regular park keepers. I am unwilling, however, to ask from the Commission so large an increase of the police expenditure as this would require. But the gate-keepers should at least be brought under stricter discipline, their standard of deportment and manners advanced, [and] they should be uniformed and their pay should be enough to enable them to live, if not comfortably, at least as well as common laborers.

I suggest that the Board authorize the number of gate keepers to be increased to double the number of gates needed for the convenience of the public, their pay to be at the rate of 15 cents an hour, or $1.50 per day of ten hours, out of which one dollar a week may be withheld for the necessary expenses of uniforming them. If, then, the ordinary period of duty should be ten hours a day, and the gates should require attendance fifteen hours a day, there would be a squad of twelve men, who could be daily employed for five hours in cleaning and caring for the various structures, seats and other moveables of the park, cleaning the shores of the pond from drifting dirt, the care of the fowls and [283] the removal of rubbish dropped by visitors. There are daily other duties for which such a squad is needed, which cannot be enumerated, but which arise from various accidents and which would come more properly and economically under the police management of the park than of the superintendence of the regular work of construction or repair. The temporary guardianship of the summer houses, bridges, etc., required on Sundays and other special occasions, would also be provided for by this organization.

In December last, during my absence in Europe, and without suggestion from me, the Committee on Salaries and Offices recommended that the number of park keepers should be increased to fifty; the recommendation was not at that time acted upon by the Board. As a second pond will need to be guarded during the skating season of the coming winter, in view of the excessively severe duty demanded of the keepers last winter, I am constrained, with much reluctance to increase the expenditure of this department, [to] recall the attention of the Board to that recommendation.

I am of [the] opinion that the use of two horses would add much to the efficiency of the police, if used for patrol duty on the drives during promenade hours. It is impossible for footmen to overtake horses driven fast or running away, and it is often impossible to stop them if seen from before, when a horseman riding the same way, can with a certain hold put himself alongside them and catch their bridle. Many fast drivers escape the keepers at present, greatly to their mortification and the injury of their prestige. But if the Board are unwilling to put these views on trial, I earnestly recommend that one horse and equipments be placed at my disposal for police use. The field inspection of the police, if made three times in the twenty-four hours—as I think it should—by the Inspector, involves a walk of at least 18 miles. This can not be accomplished thoroughly, with regularity in all matters, and it frequently happens that the Captain from footsoreness is rendered quite unfit for his duty and is not able to make a single round in the day unless he can obtain the use of a horse. The duty of the sergeants is often equally severe. An inspection on horseback, from the greater distance at which the keepers may be seen and the rapidity with which they may be approached, is much more effective than a foot inspection. If two horses are supplied for the force. I should employ one of them for a night and one for a forenoon inspection, and both for patrol duty in the afternoon.

I have the honor to report to the Board that I am mainly recovered from the illness resulting from a fractured thigh and that I have this week had the pleasure of personally inspecting nearly all the work going on upon the park. The important work of the season, the deciduous planting, I shall be able, I trust, to personally superintend, the maps and plans therefore as far as yet complete having been prepared or revised by me during my confinement.