The Waterbury Democrat., 1946-04-25

services during the special hearings.
 Mayor John S. Monagan and Attorneys Healy and Fitzgerald yes- terday again appeared at the State Capitol and presented the draft Of their proposed act. Judge Henry H. Hunt administrator of the Legislative Council, asked local authorities to present their draft yesterday. Indications are that Mf. Hunt will not permit hearings on the act before 1t comes up for de- bate on the Legislature floor.
 Tn retaining MT. Blodgett the Council has added to It's legal staff already consisting of Atty. Fred erick w. Beach of Bristol and the advisory capacity of Atty. Hugh M. Alcofn MT. Beach said he pro- posed MT. Blodgett's retention, while he leaves for Bermuda May 10 for a vacation with his family. The special session is to get underway May 2. It is possible that Atty. Blodgett will be retained as coun- sel for the duration of the Com- munity Clubs fight, 1t was indicat- ed by William o. Taylor, president of the Council. He said MT. Blod- gett was here yesterday for con- ference with Atty. William W. Ga- ger, also acting for the clubs, MT. Taylor, Oscar Liebreich and Jo- seph Cepelak.
 Regrets Having No Part
 T feel that the case is being left in very good hands while I am away" MT. Beach said, while expressing regret that he would be unable to participate in the hear ings at the Capitol.
 Mir. Biodgett, who was states att torney for Litchfield County for several years and is former men- Der of the legislature, declined to comment last night on possible moves he may make in connection with the Validating Act.
 Highlisht of the city's proposed Validating Act Is the measure sought to permit cash refunds of oyerpayment of tax bills resulting from subsequent aSsessment-reduc- tions As stated, the Council in it's full page advertisement in The Democrat, urging protest payments, included a special form letter to be included with all payments. Today Mir. Taylor said that these form letters would be distributed to all community clubs early next week.
 During the regular Feb. to Feb. gath hearings of the Board of Tax Review only 2000 appeals were heard of the 4,600 filed despite special hearings held at night and taken appearances. By means of another special session of this board in June 1t is the city'S in- tent to permit hearings on those appeals yet unheard and issue Ger tificates of Corrections for assess rnents lowered as result of the hearings. this to be followed by the cash refunds of overpayment of taxes on the original assess- ment. The tax payments are now in effect and long lines of taxpay- CTS have been gathering at the Tax Office. Up to press time today only two had filed notice of protest pay ment. Over $200000 in taxes have been paid.
 Technical Point Disputed
 It is believed that among the technicalitles involved in the citys proposed measure is that of per- mitting the Chief Assessor to present his indexed files of prop- erty assessments as a formal ab- Stract. This has been point of contention with the Council which claims that no formal abstract has been filed according to provisions of the Assessors bill.
 The joint statement of Attorneys Healey and Fitzgerald is as fol- lows:
 The proposed Validating Act submitted to the Legislative Coun- ell yesterday consists of five sec- tions. The first section of the bill contains provisions validating the Waterbury Grand List of 1945 large ly of the type and nature common ly included in the general vaIidat- ing acts passed by the General Assembly at each biennial session which apply, of course, to every municipality within the State of Connecticut. This first section re- cites many omissions concerning technical legal provisions which, so far as known, have no direct appli- cation to the existing situation in Waterbury, but which are uniformly included in Validating Acts, upon the theory that conceivably in the future claims, however unfounded in fact, might, except for the en- actment of the proposed legislation, be made the subject matter of liti- gation instituted to affect the Grand List.
 section 2 of the proposed Vali- dating Act was inserted in the bill at the direction of the Mayor in or- der to honor a resolution unani- mously adopted February 4, 1946 by the Board of Aldermen which recit- ed that 4600 appeals had been taken to the Board of Tax Review, that the Board would be unable to hear these appeals within the time al- lowed by law, and by which it was resolved to petition the Governor to call the legislature into special ses- sion for the purpose of extending the time for which the petitioners can appear before the Board of Tax Review.
 Section of the Validating Act as submitted provides for an addi- tional session of the Board of Tax Review to begin on June 1. lel6 and to conclude on June %. l046 during which may be heard appeals from the doings of the Assessor of all persons who gave written notice to the Assessor prior to February 1, iDio q intention Co take such appeal ex- elusive only Of all taxpayers whose