Los Angeles daily herald., 1888-08-09
Those Assessment lnequalities-A
Crying Wrong.

Crying Wrong.
It is a somewhat unique thing to see
any San Francisco journal exhibit any
compunctious visitings of conscience, but
the San Francisco Post, of the 9Th inst,
plunged for the nonce into this unwonted
mood, appropos of the discussion upon
unequal assessments, which we take the
liberty of reminding our contemporary
was first started by the Los Angeles
HERALD. The Post opens its remarks
thus:
The honestly assessed counties, where
property is put down at its full cash
value, are Contra Costa, the mining
counties in the north and perhaps San
JOAQUIN. San Francisco and the bay
counties are moderately assessed, while
Stanislaus, Merced and nearly all of the
southern counties are villainously under
valued.
That is to say that Los Angeles county
is villainously undervalued when the
assessment for this year is placed at
$1O7 ZOO, 900, or exactly forty-fve per
cent of the valuation of the city and
county of San Francisco last year. In
the language of Squeers, "here's richness
for you." If San Francisco were assessed
at the rate at which Mason has assessed
Los Angeles county it would figure on
the rolls at more than one thousand mil
lions of dollars, to the great relief of the
rest of the State, the "villainously under.
valued Southern counties" included.
After this spiteful dab at the Southern
counties the Post gets down to some
square talk and makes some quite valu.
able admissions:
To a casual observer it might appear
that San Francisco might more properly
be included in the latter class, but that
impression comes from the way in which
the rich and very rich cheat the Asses
sor-or to put it more correctly, from the
way in which the Assessor and the Board
of Supervisors cheat the mass of the peo-
ple by dishonesty reducing the assess
meuts of the rich and the very rich. The
moor and middle class in San Francisco
are assessed up to seventy-fve per cent
of ali they have got, while the rich are
not assessed up to twenty-five per cent.
of what they own. Here is familiar
illustration: The Board of Super
yisors, sitting as commission to deter
mine the amount of water rates to be COL
lected. decides that the property of the
Spring Valley Water Company Is worth
fourteen millions, and allows it to charge
On that basis. The same Board of
Supervisors sitting as Board of Equal
ization to determine the amount on
which the Spring Valley Water Company
shall nav taxes, decides that its franchise
and plant in this county is worth about
two millions. Ii to this be added the
assessment in other counties, which is
about million, it will be seen that the
company collects revenue on fourteen
millions and pays taxes on only three I;
which we take it as marvellous illustra-
ton of the power of Doodle to make
figures lie.
Jess 80. The Post has drawn truth
full picture of the discrimination in San
Francisco in favor of the rich against the
poor. That shows that the Bay City has
a Mason in that single regard; but he is
not Mason in that, while cinching the
moor, he scrupulously refrains from
cinching the city and county Of San
Francisco in which he lives. He is
careful to remember the scriptural
aphorism that man is worse than a
heather who neglects his own household.
The Post knows very we'll that the
most down-hearted, constitutionally dis
NAL and atrabilious man in San Fran
cisco can be asked to make an assess
ment of the property abutting on Market
and Sansome streets and Van Ness
avenue, and that he will bring in
from those three streets alone larger
valuation than the assessor has made of
the whole city and county of San Fran
cisco. This takes no account OF the in
Vulnerable corporations which, like the
Spring Valley Water Company. are as
cred for scarcely fifth of their selling
value in the daily market.
II is we'll, occasionally, to get an in
sight into the way things are managed in
tho Bay City, and the Post is entitled TO