Durango semi-weekly herald., 1902-07-14
THE TAX LEAGUE
AND THE COMMISSIONERS

iority of the board of county com
missioners to do their duty. Their
management of county affairs had DO
como 50 ro'orlous that something was
absolutely necessary to put stop to
the loose manner in which public bust
ness was being attended to. These
steps were not taken until the board
defed public opinion and continued its
favoritism. Every man in Office is LA
bile to make mistakes. but nine out of
ten remedy their defects when shown
the error OF their way. Not so with
the board of commissioners in power
during the years 1900 and 1901, and
which majority OF the board contin-
ue1 the early part of this year 1t
was on account of the utter disregard
of the public and the fattening of a
few favortes at public expense that
caused the general aXpaying public
TO become aroused to the necessity of
action. Facts count more than argu-
ment Newspapers that have been
beneficiaries of the Bradley regime
may try to dig up mistakes of past
officials and may succeedd in discover
ing certain evils, but ones which were
not called to the attention of the com
missouers at the time as ii is well
known that it has only been the past
two or three years that commissioners
have essayed tavoritism. But as stat
ed above. facts and general condition
of the county counts for more than
any newspaper statements when used
to cover up participation in public
pundering
To start in with it must be remem-
bered that La Plata county has been
great sufferer from defalcation in
the past and it came at time when
it required careful administration of
affairs to keep the business part run
ming. Some ten or twelve years ago
it will be remembered that new law
went into effect making each county
pay as it went. At that time La Plata
county was fully a year behind, al
ways anticipating the revenues one
year ahead. 1t became necessary to
repudiate one years Indebtedness for
the time being in order to get the
county on a cash basis. This caused
certificate Indebtedness along
with judgments obtained of something
like S65 000 or SIS 900. Along with this
Indebtedness came treasury short
age and for years it~took close fig
uring, and then is where the services
OF such men as Hampton. Cash and
Mason came in good play. TheN
may have made some mistakes. but
their every action was with an eye
TO the hnttprmanf the with
the result that on the first day of Jan
uary, 1902, when Mason retired from
office, taxation had been reduced to
lowest rate in the history of the coun
ty. the judgment and certificate in
debtedness has been paid with the
exception of something like ten thous-
and dollars, and in round figures $780,
600 was turned over the first of the
year, 1900. OF this sum we will state
that judgments to the amount of S10,-
600 We're at once paid, leaving net
balance of about $40 900 Now. with
out going into the details, the facts
show that on the first of this year the
amount OF money in the county treas.
my had been reduced to S25.000, none
of 1t belonging to the ordinary coun-
" revenue fund-the county funds re
dgced S2l 900 with taxes increased in
1901 35 per cent. and during these
two Years there was not an extraordi-
nary expense. There We're no floods
taking out bridges. no expensive road
worl, was done, while previous to the
two years in one instance $4,000 cash
was paid for an iron bridge across the
AMI ,f I,a ;t,1f Oh,
tanned by the city and school dis
tricts against the county the past two
years have been paid therefore the
county has been out nothing in this
line. This morning Treasurer Patter
son had on hand 81 800 funds OF
every character. about 81 900 having
been paid so far on account of bills al
lowed at this session of the board, and
in this connection we will state that
Notwithstanding the fact that the rail
roads have not paid their first half
as much money has been collected up
to this time as usually, as the total
amount of taxes to be collected this
year is in excess of that of last year
not counting the railroad tax. which
is something like $4,000. The com
missioners are facing problem to-
day. There is not money in the regu-
lar funds to pay the bills filed and the
big D do not come in until fall.
Therefore The Herald says facts
and conditions count. In the face of a
depleted treasury the commissioners
ignored law and protests and paid out
money for which the Tax League has
instituted suits, realizing that some
action had to be taken to bring the
Bradley combine to a sense of their
duty. II is results that count And it
is here where the commissioners con
cluded it was policy to make it an OBJ
ject for the treasurer to rustic for
taxes. When j. l.. Parsons went into
Office no tax sale had taken place for
three years and everything was be-
hind and the commissioners only fol
lowed the policy Of every other county
of the same class in the state allowed
the treasurer a percentage for col
lecting taxes. 1t was simply bust
ness proposition. If the treasurer
would go ahead and collect the taxes,
not receiving clerk hire unless taxes