Kelly v. Chadwick

Citations

• 104 La. 719

Syllabus

<p>Syllabus.</p> <p>Ox Motion to Dismiss Appeal.</p> <p>1. Where a local assessment, or charge upon property for street improvements is made, or levied, by compulsion of law, without regard to the assent or dissent of the abutting' proprietors, it presents the case of a taw in the sense in which the word is used in the Article of the Constitution conferring jurisdiction upon this court.</p> <p>Where the answer impeaches the validity of the city ordinance on the ground that it imposes a greater burden on the abutting property than the paving statute authorizes, there is presented the issue of legality, vel non, of the tax sought to be collected, and this court has jurisdiction without regard to the amount involved.</p> <p>On the Mekits.</p> <p>1. The city of New Orleans, by Act No. 119 of 1886, as amended by Act No 142 of 1894, was authorized by a two-thirds vote “in its discretion to provide for the paving or banquetting of any street or portion thereof at the expense of the whole city, and to thereupon force, impose, and collect of the front proprietors of lots fronting on said streets a special assessment in proportion to frontage of three-quarters of the cost of said improvement.Under the authority so conferred the city, by a two-thirds vote by ordinance, ordered the paving of Hagan avenue from Canal street to Esplanade avenue, and caused the contract for the construction of the work on certain terms and conditions to be sold at public auction. The ordinance provided that under the provisions of the act recited the cost should be borne by the whole of the city, but that in accordance with the same there was levied on all the front proprietors of lots fronting on said streets three fourths of the cost of said improvement. It was expressly stipulated that the contractor should accept in settlement with the city, in part payment of the cost to the extent of the proportion of cost for which the abutting property was liable, a transfer of the rights of the city to the