AN ACT RELATING TO BOARDS OF HEALTH IN THE SEVERAL CITIES OF THE COMMONWEALTH.

[Chapter 133 of the Acts of 1877.]

SECTION 1. In each of the several cities of this commonwealth, except the city of Boston, the mayor and aldermen shall, in the month of January, in the year eighteen hundred and seventy-eight, appoint two persons, not members of the city council, who together with the city physician shall constitute the board of health of such city. The board so constituted shall enter upon its duties on the first Monday of February then next succeeding. The terms of office of the two appointed members shall be so arranged at the time of their appointment, that the term of one shall expire on the first Monday in February in each year, after the year eighteen hundred and seventy-eight; and the vacancy so created, as well as all vacancies occurring otherwise, shall in each of said cities be filled by the mayor, with the approval of the board of aldermen. The members of said board of health so appointed, shall in each of said cities be subject to removal by the mayor for cause; and for their services they shall receive such compensation as the city council may from time to time determine.

SECT 2. Each of said boards of health shall organize annually by the choice of one of their number as chairman; they may also choose a clerk, not a member of the board, and they may make such rules and regulations for their own government and for the government of all subordinate officers in their department as they may deem expedient.

SECT. 3. The boards of health hereby constituted shall have and exercise all the powers vested in, and shall perform all the duties prescribed to, city councils or mayors and aldermen, as boards of health, under the statutes and ordinances now in force in their respective cities; and shall have power to appoint such subordinate officers, agents and assistants, as they may deem necessary, and may fix their compensation, and the compensation of the clerk before mentioned: provided, that the whole amount of such compensation shall not exceed the sum appropriated therefor by the city council.

SECT. 4. In each of said cities said boards of health shall annually, in the month of January, present to the city council a report made up to and including the thirty-first day of the preceding

December, containing a full and comprehensive statement of the acts of the board during the year, and a review of the sanitary condition of the city; they shall also, whenever the city council or the standing committee thereof on finance shall so require, send to the auditor of accounts an estimate in detail of the appropriations required by their department during the next financial year.

SECT. 5. Said boards of health, and the board of health of the city of Boston, in addition to the powers conferred upon them by existing statutes, are hereby authorized to prepare and enforce in their respective cities, such regulations as they may deem necessary for the safety and health of the people, with reference to house drainage and its connection with public sewers, where such connection is made.

SECT. 6. On the Tuesday next after the first Monday of November next, a meeting of the legal voters of each of the several cities of the commonwealth shall be duly warned and called by the mayor and aldermen thereof, for the purpose of voting upon the acceptance of this act; and the same shall not take effect in any city unless accepted by a majority of the legal voters present and voting at said meeting.

[Accepted by the legal voters of the city Nov. 6, 1877.]

ORDINANCES.

CITY ORDINANCES.

AN ORDINANCE TO ESTABLISH THE CITY ARMS AND SEAL.

Be it ordained by the City Council of the City of Newburyport as follows:

NEWBURYPORT

SECTION 1. The arms of the city shall be the following, to wit: Quarterly, first, two light-houses, in the distance a snip under full sail; second, a steam mill; third, ship on the stocks; and fourth, (the seal of Newbury in England), on a mount, three domed towers, on each a penon; crest, a mural coronet, surmounted by two hands conjoined; supporters, two female figures, that on the dexter side representing America, and that of the sinister Massachusetts; scroll, Terra Marique.

SECT. 2. The seal of the city shall bear as a device the shield, crest and scroll of the arms of the city, with the legend, "City of Newburyport, A. D., MDCCCLI."