The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1895-04-11
TO COLLECT ron THE PAVING.
The City's Action in the jefferson
street Improvement.

The city council last night decided to
go ahead and collect the assessments
upon the property owners on jefferson
street for the paving of that street with
Belgian block last summer. This action
was taken upon the recommendation Of
the committee of the whole.
Alderman Falligant opposed the report
of the committee of the whole and pre-
sented minority report giving his rea-
sons for the position taken by him. In
making his report Or. Falhgant said:
In days gone by, when the means
of communication between the CONNER
cial sections of the city and its distant
residential localities were confined to
animal propulsion, ii may reasonably have
seemed fair that these localities should
contribute substantially 10 the cQnsuuc-
ton of driVeWays leading directly to
them; but since the advent of the street
car system that beneficial result has been
greatly lessened. With the exception OF
improved accessibility for fire engines,
and such incidental benefits as are con-
nected with the delivery of household
supplies, and carriage conVeniencRs, the
benefits now revert distinctly 10 COM
mercial Establishments, such as dealers in
brick, lumber, building materials, gro
ceries, dry goods, etc, and 10 the owners
ton, both personal and material Very
much of this benefit accrues also to truck
ers transporting their products TO the
Under circumstances of this kind
heavy assessments upon adjacent prop
erty for the benefit more of
of the adjacent lot owner.
and not infrequently more of a nuisance
than a benefit TO such adjacent lot owner,
because of the dust ana interminabie
noise caused by such paVements, bear
with intense hardship upon those assess
ed, causing them to endure a wrong and
injury and making them pay out of their
own pockets for the suffering they are
III nv lnnpFun-nnf
their own, but for the public, benefit. The
jefferson street granite pavement was
constructed knowingly for the public BEN
eft, for the use and benefit of dealers in
heavy material, such as l have hereto
fore alluded to, and for a driveway which
would stand the demand upon its wearing
capacity, which council knew would be
forced upon it by reason of its being the
great and only sufficiently substantial
roadway running from the northern COM
merciaI lines to the southern residential
sections, as we'll And council changed
the character of construction OF this road
way from a comparatively noiseless one,
acceptable to the residents along its line,
tosa terribly noisy one, totally unaccept-
able and a nuisance to these
resident upon nass,t the very the GROUND Con
mercial transportation interests of the
community at large required this change
of construction whether the adjacent lot
owners liked it or not.
assessment of one-fifth the cost upon the
lot owners on each side, and three-ffths
upon the general public would come nearer
a just apportionment.
"Furthermore, this assessment has not
been put ad valorem, but by frontage. and
the owner of a lot (at Henry and Jeffer-
son streets, for instance), worth perhaps
500 to $500, is required TO pay as much as
the owner of a lot of the same frontage
at Bay and jefferson, worth $1,000 to
5000 In other words, the poorer man
is made TO pay ten times as much in pro-
portion to the value of his property as
the richer man, whilst the latter enjoys
fully a hundred times as much benefit
by reason of the substantial roadway
adjoining his business location. In this
estimate I have made no allusion to an
ad valorem assessment upon improve
nents, confirming myself strictly to the
consideration of the land value. If you
will compare again the cost of street pay
ing at Bull and Broughton with that at
Henry and Jefferson estimating for
movements of similar construction, you
will find that the lot owner at the latter
point is made to pay in proportion TO the
value of his lot fifty to seventy-five times
as much as the lot owner at Bull and
Broughton. In the latter case the cost
or assessment is a small percentage of
value. whilst in the former it is pract-
cal confiscation. Believing this system
OF assessment grossly unjust, I record
my vote in the negative as regards the
report Of the committee Of the whole"