Evening capital and Maryland gazette. (Annapolis, Md.) 1910-1922, 1917-10-18
ANNEXATION OR
NO ANNEXATION !?
Both Sides of the Case Treated as
a Business Proposition.
THE BURNING QUESTION.
Has Anne Arundel Good and Lawful
Governments at Brooklyn and
Curtis Bay?
Contributed.


! Arundel County today is annexation
| or no annexation The matter should
| be treated as clear business propo-
/ sition. The taxable basis of the terri
! tory proposed TO be annexed is about
/ one-sixth of the whole assessable
! basis of the county The bonded in
! debtedness of the county is now near
/ ly 100000 with sinking fund of about
/ $4,000, leaving a net bonded indebt-
edness of about $360,00O One-sixth
OF this would be 100000. In the bill
which has been prepared by the Bal
/ timore City Non-Partisan League pro-
| vides that Baltimore City shall pay
| the county for its school houses, en-
| gine houses, station houses and equip
ments, and also pay for Curtis Creek
bridge. These physical properties
are probably worth 100000. but their
! value is TO be arbitrated. If Balti-
more City pays for these physical
properties and would pay an addition
amounting to its proportion of the
| bonded debt, the outlying portions of
the county would be relieved to that
extent.
The liquor licenses in the section to
be annexed pay about $4,000 annual
| ~ into the County Treasury. but
against the receipt from taxation and
from liquor licenses have to be count
| ed the cost of police forces. police
magistrate, garbage removal and, as
matter of fact. the costs of court for
| criminal cases from that section
amounts TO nearly one-third of the
whole cost of the Court and if a bal
ance were struck it would appear that
the receipts in taxes from that portion
Of the district is offset to great de-
gree by the moneys paid out on ac-
! count of that territory.
Another feature of the case is that
that section pays about one-fourth Of
/ the taxes of the county The cutting
| of of that section would reduce the
| fees Of the sheriff, county treasurer,
county clerks and register of wills
Office. But ii is asserted by many per-
sons that the police force of Brook
| lyn do not execute the law in con-
| formity 10 its rights and demands and
that it is controlled by politics. II is
also said that there never has been
fair registration Of voters in Brook
! lyn and Curtis Bay, and that a fair
| election has never been held there.
There is every REASON to believe in
these two precincts at the recent
| primary that majority of the votes
cast there were marked by one in
| dividual on the outside of the polling
room
Now the burning question Is, first,
have we good and lawful governments
there?
DO the receipts in taxes from those
sections offset the expenditures which
the county has been called upon to
meet? Many efforts have been made
to incorporate the towns there, which
would require them to pay their own
local expenses, but the people of the
section, knowing that the county
would have to pay all extraordinary
expenses, the people of that section
have refused TO be incorporated.
l. Annapolis City pays its municipal
expenses and also its county tax.
Were these sections incorporated
their police, police magistrates. fire
companies, garbage removals. and
other incidental expenses would be
laid by the towns thus incorporated,
and they would still pay their pro-
portion of county and State taxes
But as so much complaint is made
about the crimes and misdemeanors
committed in that section, which are
paid for by the county, is to ask our
selves of the outlying districts
whether we should dispense with il
or continue to hold it? The matter
may be settled by a referendum. and
| if so, as every taxpayer in the coun-
ty is interested in the question, il
should be put up as referendum to
the entire county.
JAMES w. OWENS.