7. What means are used by your Board of Assessors to ascertain the value of taxable personal property in your town?

8. How is the value of stocks of merchandise ascertained?

9.

Is the amount of outstanding book accounts included in the valuation?

10. How is the value of farm property reached by your Board of Assessors?

11.

Are farming implements and tools listed at full value?

If not, what per cent

12. Is a plotted map of all real property in your town used by your Board of Assessors?

13.

In your opinion would such a map be of value?

14. What compensation for services does your Board of Assessors Per diem $

receive? Specify salary, $

15. Is land upon which buildings-are standing valued separately from said buildings?

16. What proportion of the poll tax of your town is collected? 17. Does your Board of Assessors take the oath required by law, each year, before entering upon the performance of the duties of their office?

REMARKS.

Under this head you are invited to offer any suggestion as to how, in your opinion, the existing method of assessing property may be improved.

Schedule signed by.

The figures given in the tables containing the per cent. of valuation at which property in the several towns is assessed, give the amount of the Grand List of all the towns in the State as now assessed, together with the statement of the amount that the Grand List would have reached had property been assessed at full value. The table at the close, referring to the same by counties, shows that the per cent. of full valuation in the entire State is 69.6.

As will be seen by reference to the tables of replies of Assessors, many Boards are confessedly lax in the performance of their duties and enforcement of the law under which they act.

Particularly noticeable is the fact, that section 3827 of the General Statutes has been largely disobeyed or evaded, for there are many towns, the Assessors of which make no pretention to "set in the list dwelling houses, with the buildings and lots appurtenant thereto, at their present true and actual valuation." Many seemingly neglect also to remember that section 3831 provides that "the present true and just value of any estate shall be deemed by all Assessors and Boards of Relief to be the fair market value thereof, and not its value at a forced or auction sale."

The injustice of assessments made, as it is evidenced that they are made in some towns, is apparent, for while many Boards of Assessors show a desire to comply with statute law in relation to the assessment of all property at its full market value, yet others have pursued the "time honored custom" of copying abstracts of previous years and using the same as a basis for the present year's assessment, apparently proceeding upon the theory that once a value always a value, that depreciation or appreciation in values had no existence in fact, and that a valuation once established was unchangeable, regardless of any increase in population or improvement in conditions, which might surround. the property so valued.

One

Hundreds of instances might be quoted of the most glaring inequalities in the assessments made in some towns, of what is known as "unimproved property," which, while of no material value in so far as the capacity for earning or rental power is concerned, yet the selling value is known to have been, and is, many times in excess of its valuation for purposes of taxation. case in point, is that of a tract of land located in a flourishing city, which had been for many years listed against the owner thereof at two hundred dollars per acre. When divided, however, into house lots of one-quarter acre each, and by reason of sale a change in title effected, the purchaser and new owner of the quarter acre plot was assessed at a greatly increased valuation, in one known instance the advance being four hundred per cent., the remainder of the tract remaining at the original rate

per acre.

Another is related of a very valuable piece of land situated in one of the largest cities in the State, and located on one of its most popular and populous streets, and which was assessed in the grand list for the year at a valuation of fifteen thousand dol

lars. By legal requirement this identical property was appraised by three competent appraisers at seventy-five thousand dollars.

In a decision handed down by Judge Thayer, he makes an important finding which will be of interest to every taxpayer in the State of Connecticut. He calls special attention to the statutes which provide that property must be assessed by the Board of Assessors at the present true and actual value. He explains that this does not mean what the property would bring at an auction or forced sale, but the actual market value.

"If

The case in question is that of Attorney Frank L. Hungerford against the town of New Britain. The case is an appeal of Mr. Hungerford from the assessment of his property in New Britain by the Board of Assessors and Board of Relief of that town. The Superior Court appointed, some time ago, Judge Marcus H. Holcomb of Southington, a committee of the Court to hear the case. Judge Holcomb made a report to the Court in which he reduced, by a substantial amount, the assessment by the Board of Assessors. Judge John Coats, in behalf of the town, remonstrated against the acceptance of the report of Judge Holcomb by the Court. Mr. Hungerford moved that the report of the committee be accepted. This motion was opposed by Judge Coats. The remonstrance of Judge Coats was sustained by Judge Thayer and the motion of Mr. Hungerford was overruled. In his memorandum of decision Judge Thayer says: from the facts found by the committee, viz., that the plaintiff was assessed $28,500 upon property, the fair market value of which, as proved before the committee, was $47,000, and at the time of the assessment the Assessors and Board of Relief had adopted a rule to set the taxable property in the town in the list for taxation at one-half its market value, and the value of the plaintiff's property for purposes of taxation under this rule was $23,500-if from these facts it necessarily follows that the plaintiff is aggrieved by the doings of the Board of Relief, then the remonstrance should be overruled, the report accepted and judgment rendered thereon as claimed by the plaintiff upon this motion. General Statutes No. 3827 directs that property of the character of that here in question shall be set in the list at its 'present true and actual value,' and No. 3831 provides that 'the present true and just value of any estate shall be deemed by all Assessors and Boards of Relief to be the fair market value thereof, and not its value at a forced or auction sale.' This is the legal rule to be followed in

assessing property of this character in this State. The Assessors and Board of Relief of the defendant town should have followed it. If the plaintiff's complaint were, that he was overassessed according to this rule, and it should appear that his property was assessed at more than its fair market value, it would necessarily follow that he was aggrieved. The assessment would be beyond the amount allowed by law, and so illegal, and he might complain of it, although every other taxpayer was also proportionately over-assessed. In that case, evidence to prove that all other property in town was equally over-assessed would be inadmissible to show that he was not aggrieved. But where the assessing officers adopt a rule to assess property, not at its market value, but at one-half its market value, and it appears, as in this case, that a taxpayer's property has been set in the list at less than its fair market value, but at more than one-half that value (as found by the Court of its committee), a very different case is presented. Such taxpayer cannot complain that his property is set in the list at a greater value than it should be under the rule fixed by statute. Having been assessed for a less sum than he would be under the rule fixed by statute, he is not aggrieved unless his property is assessed disproportionately to the other or some of the other property assessed. If his property went into the list at more than one-half its market value, there can be no conclusive presumption that the remaining property in the town went in at no more than one-half of its value.

If then he may be, as he is, permitted to show that the above rule existed and that his property was assessed at more than onehalf its market value, why may not the town be permitted to show that the other property in town was also assessed at more than one-half its market value, for the purpose of showing the party complaining has no cause of grievance? Before this Court can give him any relief it must be determined affirmatively that he is aggrieved. Ives vs. Goshen, 65 Conn. 456. If in the absence of testimony in such a case it is to be presumed that the Board of Relief adhered to their rule as regards all other property, so that upon appeal, the plaintiff makes out a prima facie. case by proving the rule and a valuation of his property in excess of the rule, it would yet seem to be competent for the town to show in rebuttal that the valuation of all the other property in equally in excess of the rule, and so that the plaintiff was not required to pay more than his fair proportion of the tax.

town was

The evidence offered by the town tended to prove this, and it was clearly admissible under the allegations of the application. But the plaintiff before the committee offered testimony only to prove the rule of the Assessors and Board of Relief and the fair market value of his own property." Judge Thayer quotes Judge Carpenter's opinion, who says "there are two possible ways in which a taxpayer can be aggrieved. The first is a valuation of the property in excess of its fair market value. The second is a valuation in excess of a rule adopted by the town different from the rule prescribed by statute, by which he is required to pay more than his fair proportion of the taxes." The plaintiff, Judge Thayer says, is not aggrieved in either of the two ways suggested by Judge Carpenter. Judge Thayer refers to the exclusion of evidence by Judge Holcomb, that was offered in behalf of the town of New Britain at the hearing, and concludes his memorandum of decision by stating: "I think the evidence offered by the defendant should have been admitted. I therefore sustain the remonstrance and overrule the plaintiff's motion."

Cases of a similar nature might be multiplied beyond the limit of the capacity of this Report, and still the half would not be told, for true it is, that large holdings of unoccupied landed property in the State, when located in thriving towns and cities, escape the due and proper proportion of the taxpaying duty, and in a measure, prevent the improvement which would otherwise be made in the property, should it be placed upon the market at a price nearer the assessed valuation, than when offered at the sellers which, as a rule, is many times and in some cases, many hundreds of times the value as assessed against it by the Assessors accepting the owner's valuation for purposes of taxation rather than the owner's valuation as deemed to be the true value when offering the property for sale.

It must be remembered in this connection, however, that Assessors and Boards of Relief are, not alone in neglect of duty, for the property owners themselves often fail to place a true valuation upon the property listed by them, and even neglect to make an accurate discription of the property liable to taxation. It may be said that "personal property" is more often the object of evasion than real, it being the easier concealed; truly the heavy taxpayer "hath an excellent memory for forgetting."

As will be seen by reference to the suggestions made by the Assessors, as to how the existing methods of assessing property