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1st Session.

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No. 1443.

REASSESSMENT OF WATER-MAIN TAXES IN DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA.

MAY 11, 1900.-Referred to the House Calendar and ordered to be printed.

Mr. CowHERD, from the Committee on the District of Columbia, submitted the following

REPORT.

[To accompany H. R. 8498.]

The Committee on the District of Columbia, to whom was referred the bill (H. R. 8498) amending "An act to authorize reassessment of water-main taxes in the District of Columbia," have duly considered the same, and submit the following amendment in the nature of a substitute, and recommend that the bill as amended do pass.

Strike out all after the enacting clause and insert in lieu thereof the following:

That the act entitled "An act to authorize the reassessment of water-main taxes in the District of Columbia, and for other purposes," approved July eighth, eighteen hundred and ninety-eight, be, and the same is hereby, amended by striking out the following words at the end of section two thereof: "That said water-main tax, or assessment, or reassessment shall be due, payable, and collectible on each lot or parcel of land or premises on and after the date on which the connection is made from the water main to the said lot or parcel of land or premises," and inserting in lieu thereof the following: "That hereafter, whenever a water main or mains shall be laid in the District of Columbia, the water-main assessment or tax authorized by law shall be assessed within thirty days after such water main or mains shall have been laid and the owner or owners affected by this assessment or tax shall be notified that the same has been assessed by a notice inserted daily, Sundays excepted, for two weeks in two newspapers published in the District of Columbia, and such assessment or tax shall be payable in four equal installments, the first of which shall be payable without interest within thirty days of the date of the last publication of said notice, the second within one year, the third within two years, and the fourth within three years from the date of the last publication of said notice, and interest at the rate of ten per centum per annum shall be charged on all amounts which shall remain unpaid at the expiration of thirty days from the date of the last publication of said notice: Provided, That if the assessment or tax is paid in full at any time within thirty days after the last publication of said notice an abatement of six per centum shall be allowed on the entire amount of said assessment. The cost of publication of the notice herein provided for shall be added to the amount of said assessment and collected in the same manner that said assessment is collected.”

SEC. 2. That in all cases where a water main has heretofore been or may hereafter be laid in a public street or way, and in order to secure the laying of such main the cost or a part thereof has been paid to the District of Columbia prior to the laying of

said main by any person or corporation, there shall be repaid from time to time to such person or corporation, out of the collections from the assessment for such main, all of the amounts so paid over and above the assessment chargeable against the land owned or controlled by said person or corporation.

SEC. 3. That all laws or parts of laws inconsistent with this act are hereby repealed. The first section of the substitute reported by the committee is the same as the bill suggested by the Commissioners, except that the bill provides that service upon property owners shall be made by publication only. Experience has shown that with a large number of nonresident property owners in the city it is almost impossible to obtain personal service, and assessments depending upon such service are frequently avoided on the ground of defective service. The second section of the substitute is intended to meet the three or four cases where property owners under the law as it now stands have advanced the costs, or a part of the cost, of laying water mains, and the section simply proposes to return the amount they have advanced above their tax as the same is paid into the treasury of the District from other property owners.

The letter of the Commissioners accompanying the bill is submitted herewith.

OFFICE COMMISSIONERS OF THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA,

Washington, February 13, 1900.

DEAR SIR: The Commissioners have the honor to forward herewith draft of a bill to regulate assessments for laying water mains in the District of Columbia outside the limits of the city of Washington.

The act of Congress approved July 8, 1898, provided that water-main assessments should not be due and collectible in the county until after the water had been introduced into the premises against which the assessment was to be made. This was done with the object of protecting agricultural land from assessments for water mains, but the effect has been found very injurious to the water department.

An immediate demand was made by syndicates and others interested in unimproved real estate to have mains laid through the various streets abutting their property, as no assessments would have to be paid until water was introduced into the premises, but the enhanced value of the property by having water facilities would be evident. But the demand was such that the water revenues would have been completely exhausted had the requests been granted, and the Commissioners were, in defense of the water fund, forced to adopt the rule that no mains would be laid in the county unless the cost of laying such mains was covered by deposit by the parties interested in same of such amount as the main would cost, where the amount of the assessment immediately available would not equal the cost of the main.

As a result of this several parties have been compelled to deposit with the District sums varying from about $100 to $700, and in one case as high as $2,000. This method is objectionable, and the Commissioners believe that if the water-main assessment could be levied and made collectible promptly upon the laying of the main it would be much less of a hardship upon the citizens of the District.

The Commissioners have therefore prepared, and forward herewith, a draft of a bill to amend the present law in this respect, and which they believe will remedy the matter. They would request that this bill be enacted into law at as early a date as practicable.

Very respectfully,

Hon. J. W. BABCOCK,

JOHN B. WIGHT, President Board of Commissioners District of Columbia.

Chairman Committee on the District of Columbia.

1st Session.

No. 1444.

GENERAL DEFICIENCY BILL.

MAY 14, 1900.-Committed to the Committee of the Whole House on the state of the Union and ordered to be printed.

Mr. CANNON, from the Committee on Appropriations, submitted the

following

REPORT.

[To accompany H. R. 11537.]

In presenting the bill making appropriations to supply deficiencies in the appropriations for the fiscal year 1900 and for prior years, the Committee on Appropriations submit the following report in explanation thereof:

The bill is chiefly based on estimates submitted in House Docs. Nos. 634, 649, 667, and 676, and sundry other documents referred by the House from time to time during the present session.

The whole amount recommended in the bill is $3,795,830.68, as follows:

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The following limitations not heretofore imposed and provisions for adjusting or settling accounts are recommended as follows:

On page 12 the following:

The accounting officers of the Treasury are authorized and directed to allow and credit in the account of Lieutenant-Colonel William A. Jones, H. Rep. 6- 4

United States Army, engineer of the Fifth light-house district, for the quarter ended March thirty-first, eighteen hundred and ninety-nine, the amount of one thousand three hundred and twenty-one dollars paid by him from the appropriation "Repairs, and so forth, of light-houses," eighteen hundred and ninety-nine, for repairs under the instruction of the Light-House Board and by the authority of the Treasury Department, the same not to involve the further payment of money from the Treasury.

On page 14 the following:

The Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution is hereby authorized to reimburse in the amount of two hundred and seven dollars and seventythree cents, from the appropriation "National Zoological Park, nineteen hundred," the official account of John W. Morse, assistant paymaster, United States Navy, for expenditures incurred in the purchase, care, and forwarding of a collection of live animals for the National Zoological Park during the fiscal year ending June thirtieth, eighteen hundred and ninety-nine.

On page 10 the following:

Credit in accounts of certain officers, Corps of Engineers: Authority is hereby granted to the proper accounting officers of the Treasury to allow and credit in the accounts of certain officers of the Corps of Engineers of the United States Army amounts standing against them on the books of the Treasury as follows: Captain William E. Craighill, sixteen dollars and thirty cents; Captain C. H. McKinstry, forty-five dollars; Major Charles W. Raymond, sixty-one dollars and forty-eight cents; Major Thomas L. Casey, twenty-one dollars and thirty-two cents; Major H. M. Adams, two thousand six hundred and ten dollars and forty cents; Major E. H. Ruffner, forty dollars and eighty cents; Major R. L. Hoxie, fortyfour dollars and sixty-seven cents; Major C. McD. Townsend, thirty-one dollars and ninety-two cents, and Lieutenant-Colonel W. A. Jones, two hundred and eighty-eight dollars and fifty-one cents; in all, three thousand one hundred and sixty-six dollars and forty cents.

On page 10 the following:

That the proper accounting officers, in settling the accounts of Major Francis S. Dodge, paymaster, United States Army, are hereby directed to credit the said Major Francis S. Dodge, paymaster, United States Army, with the sum of two hundred and five dollars, the amount of a shortage found to exist in a certain sealed box supposed to contain one thousand silver dollars, Government funds, shipped from New York City as a part of an amount designed for payment to the Cuban army, but which, upon being opened in the presence of witnesses, was found to contain only seven hundred and nine-five dollars.

On page 25 the following:

Adjustment of accounts of Major J. B. Bellinger: On account of duties resulting from the war with Spain, the time prescribed by law, Act of July thirty-first, eighteen hundred and ninety-four, for the settlement of his accounts having expired, the acounting officers of the Treasury be, and they are hereby, authorized to reopen, adjust, and settle the accounts of Captain J. B. Bellinger, assistant quartermaster, United States Army, late disbursing officer of the Military Academy at West Point, New York, involving appropriations for the fiscal years eighteen

hundred ninety-five, eighteen hundred and ninety-six, and eighteen hundred and ninety-seven, on the principles of equity and justice, and to give credit for such disbursements as shall be shown to have been actually and honestly made in good faith and have accrued to the benefit of the Government: Provided, That the total credits allowed under the provisions of this Act shall not be more than eleven thousand five hundred and eight dollars and seventy-two cents for the fiscal year eighteen hundred and ninety-five, two thousand two hundred and twenty-eight dollars and nine cents for the fiscal year eighteen hundred and ninety-six, and eleven thousand and fifty-five dollars and sixty-four cents for the fiscal year eighteen hundred and ninety-seven.

On page 31 the following:

That appropriations made for the fiscal year nineteen hundred, or that may hereafter be made, for the construction of buildings at any one of the branches of the National Home for Disabled Volunteer Soldiers shall continue available until expended.

On page 46 the following:

The accounting officers of the Treasury are hereby directed to credit and allow in the accounts of Edward McCauley, disbursing clerk of the Census Office, the sum of eleven dollars, being the amount paid by him for two directories of the city of Washington, District of Columbia, and one manual of the State of Kentucky.

On page 50 the following:

That so much of section six of the Act approved May twenty-sixth, eighteen hundred and ninety-six, as provides that the salaries paid to United States district attorneys shall cover and include compensation for services rendered by them in the circuit courts of appeals is hereby made applicable to the United States district attorneys for the southern district of New York.

On page 54 the following:

The accounting officers of the Treasury are hereby authorized and directed to audit and settle the claims submitted on account of services rendered and expenses incurred by Thomas S. Watts and Charles A. Watts, acting as United States deputy marshals in the northern district of New York, during the quarter beginning July first and ending September thirtieth, eighteen hundred and ninety-eight, in the same manner as if said persons had taken the oath of office as prescribed by law.

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