The Fremont weekly journal. [volume] (Fremont, Sandusky County, Ohio) 1867-1877, 1871-02-17


return Of the Real Estate Appraiser |
for this city, excluding eKurel, school
and public property was 81, ,2S5, 400.
Any one at allconyersaht with real !
estate would pronounce $500, 600
a Low assessment, But Low as the
above was, it was Afterwards mani
pnlated by the local board of equali.
zation, until it was reduced 1929, ,595,
about $15e,OeO of which amount was
striken from the most productive IN
the city, which, in fact, is paying its
owners, in rents, from t,eeaty to thdr-
II per- cent interest ON the value at
which it was returned, and is
not yielding less than ten per cent,
on what its owners would demand if
a purchaser should present himself
and seek to buy. It is true there
were additions made to assessments,
but they were made, generally, upon
unproductiye properly, away from
the business center, and all told
amounted to but $6I,745-leaving
the net present valuation $16Q,S50
Short Of what it was returned, and
giving Front Street property owners
the advantage Of about $4,000 of
that deduction, while the remaining
$10,850 is distributed through the
rest of the city as a kind of offset
for the SCI, 745 added to property in
the same localities. This may be a
proper procedure, but it does, not
appear to Us in the light Of an eqeai-
fzdaop but rather of areduetloa of
the appTaisement. For instance, if
two blocks equally weh built, on
eligible corners, and about equally
near the center of business, are ap-
praised at different values it forms
an occasion for the board 10 enquire
whysthe difference? And if no tangi-
bic reason exists, why it should be
SO, then it becomes a duty with the
board teraise the one or reduce the
other, or raise one and reduce the
other SO that both be equaIized in
the taxable list, and no deviation
from such rule is allowable, except
where it is manifest that one. is a
more eligible lot than the other and
has on it more valuable building,
or is less SO In either of these re-
spects- If one block be returned at
SlS,375 and another at SIC, ,SO0-and
the first be reduced to $15,700 and
the second to $1S,35O, there is a pal
pable reduction, not even in proper
ton, but no equalization; in fact,
they were better equalized by the
first return than by the amended
one. Wemightrefer to other instaa-
ces, butthese are sufficient for the
purpose, and show a greater disposi-
5ion to reduce than equalze, and
that the reductions were placed upon
the most valuable and productive
property. Aapifesly the State
Board do not understand themselves
empowered to reduce the appraise-
ment, but merely to equalize, and
hence have memorialized the Legis-
lature for poioer tOgyedHee the ualts-
alton of real estate 5000, 100000.
Had they eonceired themselves to
possess the po,eey to reduce, they
would not have asked that that DOW
er be given them; and if the Supe-
rior Board of the State does not Dos
sess the right, is itnot an arrogatioD
Of power. on the part of a local board
to assume to exercise a right which
its ts-superior Board does not possessi
Il IS manifestly against all precedent
in Law or tact, for the subordinate to
possess and exercise a greater power
than its superior, authority, yet in
this case 1t seems to have done. SO
and with a result not albogethercom,
mendable. .1o-