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Show REPORT OF THE SECRETARY OF THE INTERIOR 7 experience to start with. The county agent lives in a community of white people, with splendid school facilities for his children, and his salary is sufficient to provide him with first-class living quarters. The Indian Service farmer lives in an isolated region usually not within reach of good schools. Due to low appropriations for repairs and upkeep of buildings throughout the service, the quarters at farm statiow are generally in a state of disrepair and lacking in con-veniences. The Indian Service farmer is compelled to travel great distances over roads which are in the main unimproved. The restricted amounts available for the purchase of automobiles, often makes it necessary for him to run a machine five or six yeam old, and it not infrequently happens that the machine is out of commis-sion for two or three weeks. In some instances we are unable to furnish Government cara, and employees out of their small salaries are providing their own private cars without remuneration from the Government except for gas and oil. The class of farmer we are able to obtain for the salaries paid, and the conditions under which he must work, are not comparable with the county agents so common in rural communities to-day. One of the needs of the Service is to employ on the average reservation at least one man of county agent caliber, and on the larger reservations, two such men, in addition to the practical farmers now employed. The conditions described reveal some of the obstacles against which officers of the department have had to struggle in their en-deavor to properly care for the Indians. They are not conditions which may be corrected in a day or a year, nor would unlimited appropriation of funds by Congress prove to be a facile remedy. With the cooperation of the Budget and Congress, the department has progressed in Indian work during the last few yews through increased appropriations and careful administration. Only a wise financial policy and reasonable annual increases in appropriations will continue to build up the Indian Service. HEALTH The effects of the reorganization of the medical service of the Indian Bureau are becoming increasingly more apparent. The district medical directors visited nearly all of the jurisdictions within their districts and made many recommendations for improvement of the service rendered which were carried into effect. They have been able to establish cordial relations with the State and local health authorities which greatly aspist the work. I The salaries of physicians in the two lower grades were reallocated with a consequent improvement in the morale. The effect of these increased salaries is also apparent in recruiting new physicians to fill vacancies. It is, however, still impossible to obtain a suffieient |
