WALTHAM MEETING.

Globe, Volume IV, Issue 399, 22 September 1875, Page 2

WALTHAM MEETING.

A numerously attended meeting of ratepayers was held last night in the Waltham Arms Hotel, to take into consideration the valuation roll of the Heathcote Boad Board district for the ensuing year. The chair was taken by Mr M. Joyce, who introduced the business by reading the advertisement calling the meeting, and calling on Mr A. Brandon, by whom it had been signed, to explain the business he wished to bring before it. Mr Brandon explained * that, upon his examining the new roll for the purpose of ascertaining the amount at which he was assessed, he was astonished to discover that not only was his own rates raised to what seemed to him an exorbitant amount, but many of his neighbours were raised in a like excessive manner. He therefore considered it only to be his duty to call attention to the fact, in the hope of resisting what he could could not but consider as a crying injustice. Mr Lee could see only one course open to this meeting, to those who were, like himself, ratepayers in the district, and that was to appear one and all before the Commissioner and protest against any injustice done by the assessor. Mr Pope thought Waltham an unfortunate and misguided locality, which was now reaping the reward of its own past disunion, by which it had for years been without a representative in the Board/ Mr Whitelaw, on being called for by the meeting, said he had little hopes of effecting any wholesale reduction of the values set down by the assessor. He believed that when an assessor was once selected by the Board and duly appointed, he was in some measure independent of the Board, and became responsible only to the revising commissioner. If this view were correct, they would each have to fight the battle for themselves, and their present meeting could only serve to show how deep and general the fueling was that an injustice had been done them. Since his attention had been drawn to the matter, he had been at some pains to

compare the present valuation roll with that of last year, and had found a wide disparity ' of opinion to exist between the present and - past valuation. This year he was a-sessed at £BO for what he last year paid only at the rate of £42, with no change in the property further than a decline of rents. There were some notable exceptions, but on the whole a great rise had been made in the estimated income of cottage and dwelling house property. He had also compared a few properties with which he was acquainted in the Avon and Spreydon districts, as entered on the present year's rolls, and the result seemed uniformly to point to the Heathcote as in excess of either of these. People were, of course, ready to cry out whtn they felt aggrieved, when a sufficient reason was difficult to obtain, but he thought, after having given the matter the examination he had, he thought that they had fair and good ground of complaint. Not only had they a right to appeal, but they bad no right quietly to submit to have their small properties nearly doubled in assessing value until they had at least roads to reach them. He held that on section 79, Waltham, an allowance ought to have been made on account of the prospective special rate for forming the roads, and that if the present roll were to obtain as a basis of assessment for that work, it would have to be at something very much under 2s in the pound. Of course another appeal, and that perhaps of a more hopeful and legitimate naturethar the present, might be hereafter made to the Board as to both general and special rates. He would, in conclusion, beg to submit to the meeting the following series of resolutions to be discussed, and if approved, forwarded as a petition to the Road Board, as follows: " At a public meeting of ratepayers, held in the Waltham Hotel on the evening of 21st September, 1875, the fol.owing resolutions were adopted as a petition, to be forwarded to the Heathcote Eoad Board, in reference to the valuation roll of 1875-6. That as regards a large 'number of properties in this portion of -the Road Board district, the present year's valuation appears excessive, and the increase upon last year's roll altogether out of proportion either to the increase on yearly value of the properties assessed, or to any increase of Road Board money expended in the locality." "That judging from a comparison of the values at which a number of the properties are put down, the assessment would appear to have been made in an irregular and arbitrary manner, instead of being the result of a careful comparison of each individual property, with some uniform standard or principle of general application." " That a revision of the roll now before the public is necessary, in so far at least as it has reference to this locality, and that a deputation from this meeting be now appointed to wait on,the Board at its next sitting in support of the above resolutions." ■Mr Brandon cordially seconded the resolutions now submitted by Mr Whitelaw. After some further remarks, the chairman ptit each resolution to the meeting seriatim, the result being an unanimous assent in each case. Mr Pope moved, and Mr Brandon seconded, the appointment of Messrs Whitelaw, Innes, and Andrews as a deputation to wait upon the Road Board at its next sitting. A vote of thanks to the chairman termi nated the proceedings,