DEPUTATION.

Evening Star, Issue 3084, 7 January 1873, Page 2

DEPUTATION.

A deputation from the inhabitants of Half?way Push, comprising Messrs Hood Hogg, Goadby, Cameron, and Talbot, waited upon his Honor the Superintendent to present the following memorial, signed by eighty persons, respecting road rates :

To his Honor the Superintendent of Otago— The memorial of tiie undersigned ratepayers of the Halfway Bush Road District— That an assessment of annual value of properties has been made within this dist'ict, and a rate of one shilling in the pound has been made by the District Road Board, and your memorialists most respectfully object to the same on the following grounds ; —lst. To the assessment, because it has been unequally and imperfectly made, the valuer appointed by the Board having in several instances never even inspected the properties the value of which he has assessed, but has based his valuation on information received from neighbors of the owners. Your memorialists are prepared to substantiate their statement that the assessment has been unequally made by the evidence of the ratebook. One case only may be referred to in this memorial, viz., the valuation of the property of the chairman of the Board, which, if compared with the valuation of other properties, is sufficient to prove the position taken by your memorialists. 2nd. That the assessment on unimproved properties has not been made in accordance wiih the provisions of the 53rd clause of the “ Otagp Roads Ordinance, 1872,” several hundred acres, which cost 10s per acre, and which will not bring more than that sum in the market at the present time, having be'en valued at L 5 per acre fee simple, or at an annual value of 5s per acre. Against the assessment some owners of unimproved land appealed, and the amount in each case was reduced to the extent of 50 per cent, leaving the fee simple still valued at £2 lOs per acre, which U greatly in excess of its real value. 3rd. Tothe lewing of the rate, on tlje ground that the provisions of the 48th section of the Ordinance have not been complied with, no estimate having been prepared ‘‘of the money required for the several purposes in respect of which the_ Board are authorised to expend or apply the district fund, showing the several sums available for such purposes, the several sums required, the rateable value of the property assessable,” iVc., no such estimate or statement having been entered in the ntte-1/ook, as provided by the said clause. 4th. To the amount of the ra'e (one shilling in the pound), such an amount being excessive, and unnecessary to meet the requirements of the district. Your memorialists would urge that for many years they have been rated at the maximum amount of rate (last year by appealing to the General Road Board the Is rate levied was reduced to fld), and that in consequence of the low prices they are able to get for their produce, such a rate is oppressive, the more so that all the work absolutely required in the district is the maintenance of the roads already formed ; and to do this work a rate of 4d or fid in the pound is all that is required Your memorialists therefore requese that your Honor will afford such redress as your Honor is enabled to do by the 201st clause of the Ordinance, no provision having been made by which an appeal can be made against the decisions of the local Board ; and they having refused to hear objections against the rate, but only against the assessment of value. -And youv memorialists will ever yrap.

Pis Honor regretted that under present circumstances he could give the ratepayers no redress. He believed the beat plan would be to memoria'i-e the Provincial Council, asking them to repeal tho Ordinance, for he believed that with very little amendment the old system would work much better than The'deputation thanked his Honor and retired. __________