The Guardian And Evening Star, with which is incorporated the West Coast Times FRIDAY, AUGUST 26, 1932. LAND VALUATIONS.

Hokitika Guardian, 26 August 1932, Page 4

The Guardian And Evening Star, with which is incorporated the West Coast Times FRIDAY, AUGUST 26, 1932. LAND VALUATIONS.

In connection ..with the amendments to the Valuation.. of kmid Act, 1925, which . it has been stated are to be introduced next session it is thought that these will include the repeal of tho'-'e sections of the Act which admit the rights of property owners to give notice to the Valuer-General to reduce ithe capital values or to acquire their properties, and to'apply for new valuations. Section 53 of the Act provides that any person may, by notice 'in the proscribed form and upon payment of the prescribed fee, require the ValuerGenera,l to make a new valuation of his property. This section, it is stated, was original!;,' intended as an •authority to secure now valuation” upon the f-rnation of companies r- of partnership In .the present hard times, hnwe. or, (Vs authority is being used by hundred; of property owners, particularly in (1.3 North Island, to .secure Tie/duction.: An their valuations

merely for rating purposes. Values (there have fallen more .severely tnan in the 'South Island, and ft is stated tuat an some districts th©/ 'Valuation department has' been seriously embarrassed by the. numbers of applications for revaluation; A writirig-aown of lvalues in individual cages is., hardly fair to the mass of ratepayers j for if some valuations ar e reduced in this way vvhi.e the great majority are maintained as at tile last general valuation, tile minority secure reductions also in their total rates, 'while the rates collected from the majority are proportionately increased. This fact lias been referred to on 'several occasions. As it stands at present the Valuation of L.and Act places : the 'Government in a particularly /Militiuit position, lor according to Section 45 of the Act, if the owner of any land, after taking his case before the Assessment Count, is not satisfied with the valuation fixed by the Court, Ihe may' call upon the Valuer-General either to reduce the capital lvalue .to a sum fixed by himseif- or to purchase the property an behalf of ; the Crown for this stim. Since the Government under the, present circumstances can hardly be anxious to acquire'new properties, at what-’ ever prices they/ are offered, it,' is more or dess in the hand's' of, the complaining property owners and must, in general, agree to the reductions that they propose. The offering of a property to the 1 Crown at the owner’s valuation was now the ! owner’s - only remedy against a fictitious valuation, ■■and -that the • threatened cancellation of' this right 'would mean- abandonments in ’ many crises. In many coses the rates levied on a property were in exoess of its 1 rental value tin to-day’s market, and the owner; was/threatened with ruin unless he ifould secure re-' ductions .in valuation j ind, in rates. The isulrect is one of ;jp articular interest to the farming cbm;, iuriity, while it also has f special interest to governing bodies, as there S/s a tendency by the,.individual to obtain an advantage over fois fellow settlerby making use of the provision of it ho section.