7. Definition of assessments or local improvement taxes.—Assessments are special taxes levied upon specific property benefited by local improvements for the purpose of paying or contributing to the cost of such improvement. The apportionment of the assess ment is not always equal over its entire area, but is in proportion to the benefit derived from the im provement. Lots fronting on a street would be charged with a greater proportion of the cost of an improvement in that street than would lots farther away. Sometimes the lots fronting on the street are the only ones assessed, and sometimes the area of assessment extends for some distance from the location of the improvement. Allowances are made for corner lots, short lots and lots of irregular shape in order to make the assessment equitable.
Taxes are regular and are to be expected at recur rent intervals. The tax period is usually the current year, January 1 to December 31. Special assess ments are laid at irregular intervals, and therefore due notice must be given to the property owner. Lay ing an assessment amounts to the commandeering of private property, and a test of the validity of an assessment is whether or not adequate notice has been given of the intention to lay it. Assessments may be laid by a proceeding in court, or by a board of assessors.
8. Assessments laid by authority of the courts.— When land is acquired for public uses by condemna tion proceedings, the courts appoint commissioners who fix the cost of the property taken, and assess the land within a determined area according to the bene fit derived by each parcel from the improvement. These persons are therefore both commissioners of estimate and commissioners of assessment. The re port of the commissioners is subject to the approval of the court, and opportunity is given to property owners to file objections to the report if they so desire.
9. Assessments levied by aboard of principles applicable to assessments levied by autho rity of a board of assessors are similar to those applica ble to assessments levied by authority of a court. However, the board of assessors is often limited by a mechanical rule, by which it cannot lay an assessment upon any specific piece of property for more than a definite proportion of its assessed value. While in one respect this is a protection to the taxpayer, in an other it operates to retard needed public improve ments, especially in suburban districts where land values are low and in districts not fully developed.
Within the limit allowed them, the assessors are supposed to proceed according to sound economic principles in laying assessments for public improve ments. The assessments which most frequently are levied are for making physical improvements on a street, such as sewerage, regulating and grading, pav ing and laying sidewalks. After such improvements are made, the land value usually increases. The as sessed value for taxation the following year should rise not only by the amount of the assessment, but by as much as the usefulness of the lot has been increased.
which is very often more than the amount paid for the mere physical work.
The making of the improvement is initiated by the property owners or by their representatives. Due notice is given of the intention to make it, and notice is also given of the assessment levied to pay its cost. If the decision of the assessors is not satisfactory, after a hearing on objections, an appeal can be taken by judicial proceeding.
10. When an assessment becomes a assessments are a fixed lien and chargeable between buyer and seller as soon as the assessment is deter mined definitely; but in the City of New York an as sessment is not a lien until ten days after it is con firmed and entered.
11. Water their proper analysis, water rates are not a tax at all. Where water is furnished by a municipality, the rates are enforced like taxes, but they are payment for a commodity. _ In most large cities, there is municipal ownership of water and monopoly of its service, and this is necessary as a health measure. The city charges for the water in ac cordance with its consumption. It lays the charge in one of two methods, either by fixing an annual charge, or by measuring the consumption thru a meter. The owner of property does not have to use the water in his building if he does not want to. If he has a water main enter his building, he must pay a certain fixed frontage charge, whether he consumes the water or not, because water may be used for his fire protection.
12. Enforcement of lien of assess merits, water rates and charges for installing water meters ai)e all liens, which may be enforced by a sale of the property affected if they are not paid. Some times the fee of the property is sold, subject to a right of redemption. The sale sometimes takes the form of a lease of the land for a period of years. In the City of New York, the law provides for a sale of the city's lien of taxes upon the land rather than for the sale of the land itself. At certain periods a list of unpaid taxes; assessments and water rates, plus ac crued interest is made up against each lot on the tax maps. The total amount unpaid against the lot is sold as a tax lien to the person bidding the lowest rate of interest, which rate cannot be more than 12 per cent. The city executes to the purchaser an instru ment known as a transfer of tax lien. This gives the purchaser a first lien on the property (superior to all other existing liens) due in three years with interest at the rate bidden, payable semi-annually. The lien can be foreclosed, in the same manner as a mortgage, upon failure of the owner of the land to pay interest, principal, subsequent taxes, assessments and water rates when due. In the provinces of Canada the taxes are usually allowed to remain in arrears for sonic considerable time before proceedings are taken for the sale of the property; proceedings, however, vary in the various provinces.