The Daily Alaska empire., 1947-03-25
PROPERTY TAX FAILS TO PASS SENATE TODAY
Second Section of Basic Tax Program" Heav-
 ed Into Discard

1 At HidShd CelldUe UulS HlOTlllIlS killed off three most controversial measures of the current session:
 The General Property Tax; the
 Bill for Industrial Peace" and
 Equal Pay for Equal Work" A
 fourth disputed measure was to
 come before the upper house the first thing this afternoon-S. B.
 o2, uniform trade license fee act. The Senate voted down S. B.
 80, the property tax, 6 to 10, fol- lowing a very able exposition of [ the measure by Senator Victor c.
 Rivers, which was defaced only
 by his habitual allusions to big
 interest control of the Senate
 Senator Rivers seems unwilling to l conoede honesty of conviction to
 anyone opposing his own views ] Rivers attacked contentious that a property tax is unavoidable in
 Alaska because of the requirements
 of the Organic Act Such an act, | he said, is of major importance
 to the Territory and undoubtedly will be passed not too far distant ly; adding, the only reason one has not yet been passed is be- cause of the crocodile tears shed
 by Alaska land hogs" who i hold thousands of acres of the Territory's land out of circulstion. ] Taxea Every Day
 | Statements of the ''untaXability" of mining claims have not been tried out, he argued They are being taxed everyday throughout
 the world Claims have been ap- i, praised and taxed in the mining i: States; also, operators who pur-
 chase claims are able to find out i how much to pay for them Un-
 der the proposed Alaska act, own CTS would appraise their own , awnings and it would require only , moderate expense to set up the ] appeal boards in each Division. I The roads and airports asked by
 owners of mining claims to bene- , fit their properties account for
 considerable portion of the ex- , penses of running the Territory
 Rivers emphasized. He said he could see no better way to close
 the Territorys income-out go gap, , as the canned salmon industry alone would pay $600,000 per year on it's $60,000,000 investment in the
 Territory.
 l Suburbs Larger Than Cities i Rivers also stressed that corpor ate limits of Alaska cities are generally small and that residen- tial and industrial fringes have DOW grown up about them which
 contain the finest homes and are ! sometimes larger than the cities
 themselves. Those fringes are not
 now taxed, as they should be "in all fairness" to residents living within the cities and now carrying the entire burden of supporting the facilities used by all. alike. Previously, Senator N. R. Walk er-Rivers' co-author on s. B.. 80-had opened the discussion by i, pointing out that there is a
 property tax in every State. The bill before the Senate was so writ ten, Walker held, that the prop 1 to 1,n nnl1pntad Alaska, without working hardship. :, Senator O. c. Cochran replied to Walker by pointing out a great distinction between the States and
 this Territory, in that county or
 other sub-divisional governments are lacking in Alaska. In the States, he continued, it is the counties that levy and have the
 machinery for collecting property | taxes. When Alaska is organized
 as the States are, with county | governments and machinery, then
 only will Alaska be in position
 to levy a general property tax, l
 Cochran concluded |
 Cannot Discriminate
 He recited laws pertaining to real
 property to show that the Terri
 tory's government cannot single out and tax only patented hold i; ings-if a tax is levied on any
 part of real property it must be
 levied on all. The statement he declared non-refutable.
 Every piece of property from
 Point Barrow to Ketchikan would :,
 have to be appraised and assess ed The Territory has not the machinery to accomplish the task, he continued, and without the machinery, s. B. 30 cannot be looked upon as revenue measure as it would cost more to set up the collection forces than the
 measure would return. trfI,f