The Waterbury Democrat., 1938-02-22
Ouerdrafts Are
 City Obligations
Continued from Page D

poration counsel will be acted upon and various transfers made to pro- vide payment for due bills; to learn the condition of the resource sink ing fund by report ordered from the controller who, yesterday, had only last years balance of approx imately $72,000.
 Rowland Rebuffed
 Corporation Counsel O'Connor held the center of the meeting when he was called for his opinion. This, ill spite of the further att tempt of Controller Rowland to have another letter to the mayor call ing for action against his predeces- sor, read into the corporation coun- sells opinion.
 Commissioner Goss rebuffed the controller when the latter attempt ed to have this letter apply as an amendment" to the supplemental ruling for which the commissioner asked, that specified above.
 Law Is Quoted
 Defining claims against the city as any payment due for services un- dertaken in good faith, and pointing to the fact that the appropriations for his own office were always far under the amounts the city officials knew would be necessary for adjust ment of hundreds of claims against the city, Corporation Counsel o. Connor explained. by quoting from Corpus Juris, the meaning of floating indebtedness, thereafter making his ruling, as follows:
 Floating Indebtedness. Although the phrase may have a clear and well understood meaning in the commercial world, it should be con- strued in connection with the other language used, with view of ascer- taining what was intended to be accomplished by the act in consider ation. AS applied to municipal cor porations, that mass ol lawful and valid claims against the corporation, for the payment of which there is no money in the corporate treasury specifically deSigneA, nor any taxa ton or other means of providing money to pay, particularly provided
 q, therefore, advlse you that the money in the resource sinking fund derived or collected from January first to May first, 1888, from amounts due the city of Waterbury from the resources of the year 1887, can be used to pay the legal and valid claims against the cit. of Water bury incurred during the year 1887, even though the appropriations may be overexpended.
 T am also of the opinion that money derived or collected from sources of revenue from Jan. 1st to May 1st, 1888, due the city of Wat erbury prior to Jan. 1st, 1887. can be used to pay the floating indebt- edness of the city of Waterbury, which includes the legal and valid claims incurred during the year 1937."
 Thus. in the last portion, the cor poratlon counsel rules that all monies due the city even before last year may be applied to any float ing indebtedness, or deficit" as of last year. This makes available something more than $1,00O,000 in back taxes uncollected, as tabulated by The Democrat some weeks ago.
 They Were All There
 AS has been the case since Con- troller Rowland took office, the meeting yesterday was attended by William B. Pape, son of the pub fisher of the Republican-Am and four reporters from those pa- pers; William J. Armstrong, mouth piece" and specially obtained lieu tenant-general in command of MT. Rowland's office and actions; James F. Purcell, accountant and special file keeper, appointed to the con- troller's office in 193O and raised from $500 to $4,000 a year some months before he undertook his special job of advising" MT. Row. land concerning missing records and warrant books" presumably in his charge as head accountant.
 There were, too. William F. Burke, president of the Merit System asso- citation of Waterbury, erstwhile tenn porary president of the ci-devant citizens non partisan committee" and Good Government association of Waterbury: and Mrs. Charlotte Root. officer of the latter group when transition was made from "non-partisan" to good govern ment."