The Valuation of Public Service Corporation Property: Transactions of the American Society of Civil Engineers,; vol. LXXII, June, 1911, ASCE 1190Riggs, Henry Earle
General
The Valuation of Public Service Corporation Property: Transactions of the American Society of Civil Engineers,; vol. LXXII, June, 1911, ASCE 1190
This Michigan Central case was a suit to restrain the collection of
taxes based on the new assessment, the railroads claiming that their
property was assessed at full value, while general properties of the
State were assessed at a considerably lower percentage than full value.
This suit was essentially a valuation of the railroad properties as of
April, 1902. This work was done along the same line as the former
valuation, by a portion of the same staff. The old work was brought down
to date, and certain special studies were made, which resulted in a
change of right-of-way valuation, as has been related.
In the trial of the case of Michigan Central Railroad _vs._ Powers, the
two valuations were fully testified to by all the men engaged, and the
record relative to the appraisal fills several volumes.
Subsequently, in 1906, Professor Cooley was engaged by the
Attorney-General, and, re-assembling the staff, brought the work down to
date as of April, 1906.
There has been no permanent force engaged on the work in Michigan, and
the re-appraisals have only been made as actual necessity demanded.
_Market Value of Stocks and Bonds._—During the progress of the appraisal
of 1900 an independent force of men was engaged in studying the market
values of stocks and bonds of Michigan roads with a view to securing
information on every possible line that would aid the appraiser in
reaching proper conclusions, or enable him to check his figures. These
figures were used only as a check, and no report of the details of this
work was submitted.
_Error in Published Reports as to Michigan Work._—In several articles
descriptive of the Michigan work, one quite serious misstatement of fact
has inadvertently been made. The writer is not quite sure how or where
the wrong impression originated, but it has been noted in several
articles and editorials.
Substantially, all accounts are similar to that of Professor Taylor,[6]
which is:
"In looking over the notes and results of the work done in Michigan, it
was noticed that Mr. Cooley's engineers, car-men and other experts went
over the property of each railway company and enumerated and valued the
same, and then the railway company generally had its own men perform the
same work in order to check up the appraisal made by the State
authorities. Thus, this expensive work was unnecessarily duplicated."
Undoubtedly this statement was made in good faith, and has gained
currency by not having been corrected, but it is not the fact.
The Chicago and Northwestern Railway took immediate steps to make
surveys and secure data, as has been described, and made a complete
appraisal, using the Michigan forms. The result of this appraisal was:
Chicago and Northwestern, present value $8,551,530
State appraisal, present value 8,281,090
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Elsewhere in the archive
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account