CITY COUNCIL.

Globe, Volume IX, Issue 1237, 21 February 1878, Page 3

CITY COUNCIL.

A special meeting of the Council 'was held last evening. Present —His Worship the Mayor, Crs. Ruddenklau, Ick, Radcliffe, Toomer, Jameson, Briggs, and Pratt. The minutes of the last ordinary meeting were read and confirmed. The Mayor said that this was a special meeting, the first business before which was to consider the report of the finance committee. This being so, however, did not peryent ordinary business from being brought forward. He would now ask the Town Clerk to read the report of the committee. The Town Clerk then read the report as follows : It having come to the knowledge of some members of the finance committee that the assessed value of some properties on the list for the year 1878 were considerably _ below tlieir proper rating value, your committee, in the interests of the Council, considered it advisable to inspect the list to ascertain the correctness, or otherwise , of the allegations. The committee held two meetings, at the first of which it became quite apparent that many properties, in the opinion of the committee, were assessed too low, while others appeared to have been assessed under a misapprehension. In comparing the assessment of 1878 with 1877 your committee found large reductions had been made in the value of properties, which, in their opinion, were not warranted. Your committee therefore adopted the assessment for 1877, as settled by the A ssessment Court, as a fair and reasonable value of the property in the city, and instructed the town cierk to lodge objections against the assessment of many properties which were below that valuation. H Thomson, Chairman.

The Mayor said that as chairman of the committee whoso report had just been read, it might be as well for him to move its adoption. The reason of its being brought before the Council now was to ascertain whether in their opinion the objections lodged by the town clerk to the assessment in accordance with the instructions of the finance committee should be sustained or abandoned. From what had been stated to them by some ratepayers, the Finance Committee had resolved tojoverlook the whole assessment roll, and the result of that had been that they had under the Eating Act lodged a number of objections to the assessor’s valuation as being too low. There was no hardship, so far as the owners of the properties were concerned, as they could appeal against tho objections of the Council. In adopting tho assessment of 1877 as a basis of comparison with that of the present year, it must be understood that they had done so upon the rate list as coming from the Assessment Court after its having been signed by the Judge, and when the whole of the appeals against it had been heard. He might mention time there was only one case in the 1878 roll in whicn the valuation of 1877 had been exceeded. It must also be borne in mind that the assessment for 1878 was very considerably below that of 1877, and that deficiency was more apparent when they they took into consideration the very large number of new buildings, together with schools, parsonages, &0., which had been erected.

Cr. Briggs thought his Worship was under a slight misapprehension as to schools. By the Education Act of 1877 all schools were exempt from rating. His Worship said he was aware of that. He was alluding to the assessment as given in by the Assessor to them. In this the assessments of all parsonages, schools, &c., appeared, and went up before the Assessment Court. Now for 1878 this was not yet done, and even with all these returned the assessment of 1878 was considerably lower than that of 1877, as returned after these deductions had been made. This fact induced the finance committee to scrutinise the rate roll, and he might say, as instancing a curious Ehasc of human nature, that three ratepayers ad appealed against their assessment as being too low. These were the reasons which had induced the finance committee to bring the mutter up, and it was now for the Council to say whether the objections should be sustained or not. He begged to move the adoption of the report. Cr. Pratt seconded the motion. Cr. Ick desired to say a few words on this subject. Before he did so, he desired to say that he fully believed the Einance Committee intended to do their best for the interests of tlje city; but he contended that t hey had taken a wrong view of the position. The matter should have been considered at least a fortnight before it had been, and by the whole Council with calmness and a full knowledge of the subject. He could not think jhat the three gentlemen comprising the Einance Committee, however great their abilities might be in their respective walks of life, could come there and in four or five hours’ time —which he believed was the extent of time spent revise the whole assessment rpll of Christchurch, and say this was too high or too low. They were sitting down to revise the work of a professional man, one who had been in the service of the Council for many years, and who had acted in the capacity of assessor before. Ho had several objections to the way in which the report had been arrived at. First, ho objected to it because he contended the work should have been done by the whole Council, with the assessor present to give expin nations, Secondly, from the time the gentlemen engaged upon this work had spent on it, he felt sure they could not go through it properly and give to it that consideration it demanded. Therefore he could not support the motion. It might be that the assessment this year was lower than last, but then they must recollect that the assessment of 1877 was exceptionally high. It would bo better to allow the jjaatter to go for this year, and next year

give sufficient time to get up a proper valuation.

Or. Briggs should support the adoption of the report, and would give a few reasons for doing so, in reply to what had fallen from Or. Ick. That' Cr. had said—and no doubt truly —that the matter should have been brought up before the whole Council and considered calmly. But seeing that the matter was not, brought, up before, he thought ( hat the finance committee had only done their duty to the ratepayers whom they represented by taking the steps they had when the matter was brought under their notice. [Hear-, hear.] It might be all very well to say that throe gentlemen were not competent to sit on the work of an expert —and generally lie agreed with this view—but on going through the roll the finance committee discovered that there were some glaring inconsistencies as compared with the valuation of the preceding year, which should have been explained by the valuator. Cr. Ick had referred to the fact that the valuator was not present at their meetings. [The Mayor He was requested by letter to attend.] He (Cr. Briggs) was very sorry ho bad not done so. Row then fora few examples of the inconsistencies he had referred to. There was one property with which he was acquainted, and which had improved vastly in value since last year. In 1877 chat property was valued at £SOO which was paid cheerfully and without appeal. This year it was valued at £3OO. Now he wanted to know the reason of this being done. Another property with which he was also acquainted was valued at. £l5O last year, and this at £l2O. Ho desired to know upon what principle this valuation—taking into account the general increase in value of property in Christchurch —had been arrived at. Another property, upon which a three-storied brick house had been built, was assessed at £IOO per annum, when £SOO could be got for it. These were only a few instances of what they found on going over the roll. But what weighed moat with them was the fact that in nine cases out of ten in which last year Mr Cuff appeared to support objections to the valuation, the majority of which were allowed, this year he had made large reductions upon his own valuations of last year. It must be understood clearly that the committee did not object so much to the smaller properties awny from the centre being reduced, but they did so most strongly to the large business premises in the centre of the city, the value of which had greatly’ increased. He for one was not prepared to allow it to go forth to the world that the assessed value of property in the city of Christchurch in 1878 was some £IO,OOO below that of 1877. [Cr. Ick : Only £3000.] He repeated £IO,OOO, because the assessor had taken in school buildings, &c., and if the list had gone up to the Magistrate as returned to them, the difference would have been some £IO,OOO, as compared with last year. These were the reasons why he had come to the conclusion to support the report as presented by the Finance Committee.

Cr. Jameson would like to know whether notice had been given to the parties against whose assessments the Council had appealed.

The Mayor said that until the Council confirmed the action of the committee as to sustaining or otherwise the objections made by the committee, notice, of course, would not be given. Cr. Ruddenklau felt that as the executive officers of the Council the blame rested on the Mayor and town clerk. They should have seen the errors which now appeared before they had done. What ought to have been done was to call a meeting to consider the rate roll. But instead of that they had it brought up at the last moment, when to his mind it exposed the bad business tactics of the Council. They would, if they did not mind, find themselves landed in litigation as they had before. For these reasons lie could not'support the report of the finance committee.

In reply to Cr. Jameson, The Mayor said that the objections would represent a very large sum of money. Cr. Jameson said" that he thought that the action taken by the finance committee was too late. Besides, the assessment of the previous year was very excessive, and therefore they must expect that in the year 1878 there would be some reduction. Therefore he thought that they should not take any further steps.

Cr. Toomer said that when Mr Cuff’s report on the valuation was presented there was no remark. The matter was allowed to go on for several weeks, and now by a side wind they got three gentlemen to come in and tell them that they were wrong. He quite •concurred with Cr. Jameson that they ought to let the matter stand.

The Mayor, as chairman of the finance committee, replied to the arguments adduced against the report. They did not put their judgment as against that of an expert. What they had done was to take the list, which came from the Assessment Court, after it had passed through the ordeal of revision and appeal, and compare it with that of the present year. As regarded the assessment for 1877 being too high, there was not a word said of the thousands which were struck off. It had cost the city some £4O in advertising the reductions made on the assessment of their assessor. He would state, without fear of contradiction, that property in Christchurch had enormously increased. Councillors had asked for examples. He would give them two. The South British Insurance offices had been returned as a vacant lot, with a small wooden house on it valued at £6O per annum. Was that a fair valuation ? Then there was Mr Lewis’s offices opposite, assessed at £IOO per annum. Was that right ? Should got their assessor have seen when these buildings would be finished, and rate them accordingly. Then there was the Christchurch Club, which last year was rated at £650 without appeal. 'This year the assessment was reduced to £4OO. Why was this? Cr. Ruddenklau hud said somebody was to blame. Now the rate roll for 1878 came in on the 15th January, and Cr. Ruddenklau expected that he (the Mayor) would go over the rate roll. Cr. Ruddenklau when he said this hardly knew what overhauling the rate roll meant. The assessor had had notice to attend a meeting of the finance committee, but this meeting was frustrated because the day fixed for it was the one upon which the objections should ho lodged. There was no opportunity of consulting the Council, and all he could do was to summon the finance committee to consider the matter. The reason why he had not looked at the roll was that he and the Council also had confidence in their assessor. This was what had thrown him (the Mayor) off his guard. The Council must recollect this, that the clause of the Act under which they had acted was the only check they had upon their assessor. They must also recollect that they would be establishing a precedent in many cases by admitting these low valuations. One hundred and nineteen objections had been sent in to the Council ns regarded the names. The fact was, the old roll had been copied with all its imperfections, and without correction. There were only seventy-two objections to the assessment being too high. What he said was this, that the less number of objections they had,'the lower valuation roll they would have. If this year’s assessment was reduced 25 per cent, they would find that instead of seventy objections they would only have about seven. He might say that ho had asked the assessor if he could give the committee any information which would enable them to abandon some of them. He declined to do so, and further would not allow even a clerical error without going before the magistrate. This he did not think was proper conduct on the part of the assessor. The assessor also stated to him that ho was aware that the Mayor had a spite against him, and that they had held hole and corner meetings ; and further that what they were doing would raise a clamour amongst the ratepayers. Now he (the Mayor) might say this, that their assessor was heard to say in front of a building in Christchurch that it would not pay him for £SO to raise the assessment on his clients. He (the Mayor) might say that in the discharge of his public duty he should not be deterred from doing what he thought right in the interests of the ratepayers. Cr. Ruddenklau said after what had fallen from the Mayor as to the glaring absurdities in the roll, he felt that he ought to move an amendment follows—“ That the Finance

Commit,tee be instructed to proceed to object upon the cases of strikingly low valuation in the assessment roll.” If the Mayor had given them the information tie now had before ho should have supported the report.

The amendment was not seconded, Cr. Jameson said after the remarks of the Mayor, he felt it to be his duty to vary the opinion ho had expressed,and give his votefor the adoption of the report. Cr. Ick thought that the best way would be either to accept, or reject the report. What, he wanted to see done was the whole Council to be called together at an early ditto and consider the whole question of the roll. By this moans they would be more likely to arrive at a proper decision on the matter. The Mayor pointed out that a meeting of the Council could at, once bo convened, and the whole of the objections raised, or any portion of them abandoned. All that, the adoption of the report meant, was that the action taken by the finance committee was approved by the Council. The Mayor said that he would undertake that the Council should be called together to consider the question of the assessment roll Cr. Ick moved—“ That the whole of the Council be called together at the earliest possible dace, to consider the question of the assessment roll.”

The Mayor could not see that, this was an amendment on the question now before the Council. The work had been done by the finance committee, and all that was to be done was to reject or accept the report,. Cr. Ick’s amendment was not seconded. The question that the report be adopted was then put. Ayes—Crs. Briggs, Pratt, Radcliffe, Ruddenklau, and the Mayor.

Noes—Crs. Tooraer and Ick. The motion was therefore carried

After transacting some further business of a routine character, the Council adjourned until Saturday next, at 7 p.m., to consider the objections lodged against the valuation of the city by the assessor.