Evening star., 1932-02-07

ed to a political office. They are hu-
, man beings. The pressure to which
they respond Is against full-value as
sessment. Full value being such an
elusive thing under any conditions, the
tendency everywhere is to undervalue
for the purposes of taxation and, as
compensatory in part, to boost the tax
rate.
Here in Washington the situation is
exactly reversed. The tax assessor is
an appointed official, responsible only
to Congress to carry out the law enact
ed by Congress. The law says that
property is to be assessed at full value
The tax assessor as an official is
amenable only to the pressure from
Congress, which is to comply with the
law AS an individual, Mr.. Richards
reputation among the members of Con-
gress as well as in the community for
personal honesty, integrity and eff
cheney, is not in dispute. The result is
that Washington's assessed valuation
bears higher relationship to full value
than that of any other city in the coun-
! try Yet, the official ratio here is 100
per cent, and the actual ratio, as COM
| pared with actual sales, is about 80
per cent.
What is the result, when the Mapes
| Committee attempts to compare the
So-called full assessment" of other
| cities with the full assessment of Wash
! ington?
The Mapes table comparing actual
and "full-value" assessments tells its
own story. 1t is found that Washing
tons actual assessment-a Washington
in which only the private, taxable prop
erty and none of the vast taX-eXempt
properties OF the Government is in
Cluded-is exceeded by the actual as
SeSSment of only two citieS-CleVeland
with a population nearly twice as large,
and Boston, with a population over
100000 in excess of Washington.
Washington's actual assessed valuation
/ is greater than that Of nearby Balti-
more, of Pittsburgh, St. Louis, San
| Francisco. 1t Is more than four times
as large as Minneapolis, the city that
most nearly compares with it in popu-
| lation among those compared
| Raising all the assessments by the
! committees method of personal CORE
| Spondence with men and organizations
familiar with property values" to what
! the committee regards as full value +"
one finds that WaShington'S full-value
! assessment is exceeded only by the full
! value assessment of six cities-Cleve-
| land, st. Louis, Boston, Pittsburgh San
Francisco and Buffalo On this basis,
washington. with population of 486,-
1863, has property valued at S1,313,848.-
ISL. as compared with Cleveland, with
population of 900,429 and property
valued at 81, ,627, ,229,412 In other words,
| Cleveland's population exceeds Wash
lngton's by 85 per cent, but its alleged
1ull value" exceeds that of Washington
by only II per cent. That is an alb
surdity on its face. And the case of
| Cleveland is typical
| Using these "full-value" assessment
| figures, the committee applies them to
| the realty tax levies to get what it
calls the adjusted" tax rates The
lower the full value" figure, by this
method the higher the adjusted tax
| rate; vice versa, the higher the
full value figure, the lower the ad-
| JuSted tax rate. Because of the rela-
lively low "full-value" figures arrived at
| by the committee for other cities. their
! resulting adjusted tax rates" appear
| relatively large alongside that for Wash
lngton where the assessment figure is
relatively high.
Weakness Of System Shown
In the hearing of the Joint Citizens
Committee by the Senate appropria-
tions subcommittee in 1920 the ques-
ton was discussed, What is the re-
| liable yardstick for measuring ac-
curately the comparative tax burdens
of cities?"
The further question was asked.
Can it be made by joining tax rate
to assessed valuation of taxable prop
erty when full valuation is commanded
| by law? Or by joining tax rate to full
valuation Of taxable property as re-
| ported, estimated or guessed at by Tom,
Dick and Harry, officially or unoff-
cially?"
The Citizens Joint Committee after
comparing low tax rate, high assess
ment cities with high tax rate. low
| assessment cities, and applying this
| yardStick of measurement of compare
! tive tax burdens with extraordinary
and incredible results. condemned this
standard of comparison as utterly un-
reliable.
The Citizens Joint Committee chose
States which, like Washington had
! low tax rate and a high standard of
assessment and compared their tax
| burdens. measured by this misleading
! yardstick, with those of sample" cities
that had been mentioned in House
committee and House debate as hav-
ing higher tax burden than Washing
ton. The comparison showed that
sample" cities of Florida, Mississippi,
Texas and Kentucky were taxed twice
and three times as much as cities of
| Ohio, Rhode Island and Virginia. as
well as the District of Columbia, thus
bringing the inevitable conclusion that
| the sample" cities were grossly and
Shamefully overtaxed or that the yard
stick of measurement was inaccurate,
worthless and misleading.
Comparisons of the same nature can
be made today. They will show, for
instance, that the people of Charles
ton, S. c., pay a higher tax than the
people of any of II principal cities in
Ohio, Cincinnati and Cleveland in
cluded; that the people of Texas cities
are taxed as a rule, almost twice as
much as the people Of Virginia cities;
that the people of San Antonio, Tex,
pay practically twice as much in taxes
as the people of Dallas, in the same
State; that the people of Jacksonville
pay more than twice as much as the
! people of either Miami or Tampa. in
the same State. and bear tax burden
that is twice or more as large as the
| tax burden borne by the people of st
Louis Providence, Cincinnati, San
Francisco, Birmingham or Washington;
more than three times as much as the
people of winston n-Salem, N. c., but
| not as mucn as tne people VI Aloy,
N. Y, or Sacramento. Calf.
Who can believe that If the yard
stick of measurement adopted were &C
curate, such preposterous conclusions
would result?
The moral OF the fable Of COM
parsons by such methods recalls the
moral recited by the Citizens Commit
tee "You cannot breed truth and re-
liability by crossing tax rates with lies
or widely varying local guesses con
| cerning full valuation Heredity taints
with talsity and permeates with de-
ception every atom of the offspring OF
such parents"
| How Bureau Proceeded.
| The Bureau of Efficiency, to escape
| the hazards of attempting to estimate
what is an accurate or acceptable full
value figure for other cities, went about
getting comparable full-value assess