The New Orleans bulletin. [volume] (New Orleans [La.]) 1874-1876, 1874-05-31
THE FISCAL BUDGET OF THE CITY
FOB 1874.

porary, the Bee of the 23d, the followin,
able and truthful review Of the fnancia
condition of the city. We commend it t.
the readers Of the BULLETIN as worthy o
their attention and consideration
The saddest period of the year has come
for the property holders. They must pay
their tax bills, and they have not one
months time to do 50. The City Admins
traitor of Finance announces that on the
18th of June all unpaid tax bills will be
placed in the hands of the City Attorney,
who will forthwith proceed to collect them
The law is stringent, and excerpts no one.
Whether house is rented or not, whether
the rent has been paid or not, the city must
be paid, else the income will be seized or the
property sold at sacrifice. The entire
diminution offered this year to the tax
PAYERS does not exceed one half of one per
cent This then, is the fourth year in which
taxation is carried to the limit Of confisca-
ton. How can this be borne, particularly
by those whose property has yielded absO-
iMtely nothing. Several journals who have
opposed the reforms repeatedly urged by us,
while it was possible to adopt them, now
acknowledge that tho situation is despcr-
ate one, and that many women, widows,
minor children and property holders of all
classes of the population will be despoiled
and ruined, for it will most certainly be out
Of their power to satisfy for the fourth time
the fiscal wants of the city. Why then did
not those journals assist us in the efforts we
have made to obtain a tightening OF the
load : 1t is rather late to shed tears over
the fate Of the property holders when moth
ing can be done for Them"
And what, after all, will be the upshot of
this barbarous policy, which consists in
destroying source of revenue by endeav
Oring to obtain from it more than it is able
to yields What are we to think Of these
seven men, who have chuckled over the
declaration of one Of them that the assess
ment is to be maintained and even increased,
for it is higher by two millions than that of
last year, and these 1872 millions have been
bOastingly announced, when more than four
millions Of uncOllected back taxes were
Acknowledged when tax bills exceeding a
million were being handed for collection to
the officers of the courts, and when walls of
despair were the response to the self-cOn-
graduating illusions of those City Admin
istrators, SO we'll paid and 80 utterly indif-
ferent to the sufferings of their constit-
ueBtsf How comes it that not one Of them
has called attention to the fact that this
and that the taxable capital is over estimat-
cd by at least fifty per cent! How Is it
that no one of them has bethought himself
that if the assessment is to be kept up at
such fictitious figure, the taxes should be |
reduced in order to establish some reasOna- |
bic proportion between what the tax payers
o We and what they have left between their |
incomes and their charges'
We call upon the city Administrators to
their own conscience and to de-
clare whether there is $l32 OO0, 600 worth Of
real estate, or other taxable property, in the
various districs of New Orleans, even in
GLIDING the lately annexed District of Car
rollton. We ask them what they would
been prOpounded to themf They would
most certainly have replied that this assess
meBt was only worth the paper it was writ
ten upon, and that in reality it ought not
TO have exceeded $4,000. During the past
two years capital has been steadily disap-
pearing, because it cannot find profitable
and safe Investments; this is cOnclusively
shown by the depreciation Of every descrip-
Jon of stock, whether belonging to indus
rial, banking, insurance or railroad COM
Danies.
Everything has been deprecated by tax
ltiOn, and it is beyond the power of almost
my one to procure any considerable amount
# money. And it is in tho midst of this
universal financial debility, of this wide
pread misery, that the territorial assess
nent of Now Orleans is kept up to the figure I
4 $l32 100000. and that property owners ,
no called upon to pay an annual tax of tour !,
YER cent, which is more than the property
sually yields! You who keep up this fic-
ion in your financial statements, and who, {
n order to indulge in that vainglorious boast, s
acrifice justice, right, equity, reason, are
on not afraid that some day you will be
20 - e A.. Y
footsteps of the Radical administration, by v
,hom this frightful state of thing, been i
rcated, inasmuch AZ you have done nothing
, modify its
What is to become of these ruined proper n
Y holders Of these despOiled widows, Of 0
lese homeless minors, who might still have 4
kcd out q precarious subsistence if you had
one your duty in the pIemisesf Will you D
nswcr that You are not responsible for the
ty assessment Will you say that the law 81
'mpels you to keep it up at the fabulous !,
cure when compared to the market value u
real estat~! Will you say that you were I;
lund to consult the State authorities, and o.
lat you could do nothing without them ! H.
ill you say that the assessment rolls were
It in your hands, and that you could not
UGH them without mourning the wrath of sc
executive more powerful than yourselves! ~
ill you say, finally, that this reform of the !,
sessment was beyond your reach because y
III would not be permitted to carry it out : 80
,, you cannot plead that excuse, for no one in
Duld accept il. tr
Everybody knows that. in the absence of =,
her powers, this one, at least, still re- =.
sined into your hands, and, by exercising hi
you might have made radical change in be
8 City Administration. An assessment of 8,
,ty millions would have necessitated a ~
neral reform. You would have been mi
npelled to reduce the expenses in every bu
partment; to cut down salaries, to do be
ay with sinecure Offices; to reduce the
BIT or the interest on the debt, which
oLnts to the same thing; to adopt a ~
,ple and more economical system of city T ~.
to limit closely, in your C%
1get, all expenses not easy to be con ms
lied and, in fine, to place everything t 10;
IN the footing of An administration i'm i .a'
and deprived. for time, at -. ~
1t, Of all its usual resources You might ' o..
o done this. There was no one to pre- sl
It it, and everybody demanded it, nay, ~ ~
rybOdy demanded il from you, for You ~