DUNEDIN RATING

Grey River Argus, 13 March 1940, Page 4

DUNEDIN RATING

LIST HELD TO BE VALID.

DUNEDIN, March 11. The Assessment Court, with Mr J. R. Bartholomew, S.M., presiding, was packed to capacity this morning when objections to assessments by the city valuer in respect of property in the city were to b e heard: The first matter with which the Court had to deal, one which occupied its attention all the morning, was a notice of motion of objection by Eileen Macartney and Jane A. Thompson asking for an order declaring that no valid valuation list for the city of Dunedin had been prepared for the year 1940 as required by tlie Rating Act, 1925. Shortly, the grounds for the objection were that the list as prepared had not been transmitted to the local authority on or before January 15, as prescribed by the act and in the form prescribed by the act; that the fists were written in pencil; that since January 15 various alterations had been made (insertions and/or erasures) without proper authority, and contrary to the provisions of the act;' that various rateable properties comprised in the list did not contain the material particulars required by the act; that the list did not remain in the custody of the local authority; and that generally the list purporting to be a. valuation list of the district had not been prepared in conformity with the act. “The duties and functions of the Assessment Court are clearly defined in the Rating Act,” said the Magistrate, when giving his decision. Ther e might have been fragmentary omissions from the list; but the Court had power to add or erase. He found, therefore, that there was a valid (valuation list before him, and the objection must be ruled out. There was the matter of the propriety of making out the list in pencil. While this practice had been followed in the past, it had been clearly shown that it was a reprehensible one, and it would have to cease. The whole procedure would have to be revised. This would man increased routine work; but it would rule out any similar objections in the future.