structing sewers, making, grading and opening of streets, sidewalks, crosswalks, parks, public grounds and other local improvements to be assessed in whole or in part against the owners or occupants of lots and premises to be benefited thereby, or by general tax, in whole or in part as they may deem just and proper; and they shall have power to cause the expense of paving any street or streets, and of opening and paving lanes and alleys, and the damages assessed for laying out said lanes and alleys to be assessed upon the premises adjoining and to be benefited thereby, and upon such premises only.

SEC. 56. Whenever the common council shall determine that the whole or any part of the expense of any public improvement shall be defrayed by an assessment on the owners or occupants of houses and lands to be benefited thereby, they shall ascertain, as they may think proper, the estimated expense of such improvement done or to be done, and shall declare by an entry in their minutes whether the whole or what portion thereof shall be assessed to such owners or occupants, specifying the sum to be assessed and the portion of the city which they deem to be benefited by such improvement, and the costs and expenses of making the plans and assessments incidental thereto shall be included in the estimated expenses of such improvement.

SEC. 57. The common council or a committee appointed by them for that purpose, consisting of not less than three freeholders of said city, and not interested in any of the property so benefited, shall thereupon make an assessment upon all the owners or occupants of lands and houses within the portion or part of the city so designated of the amount of the expenses aforesaid, in proportion as nearly as may be to the advantage which each shall be deemed to acquire by such improvements, and shall make out an assessment roll, in which shall be entered the names of persons assessed, the valuation of property for which they are assessed, and the amount assessed to each of them respectively; and in case such lots or parts of lots shall belong to a non-resident, or the owner or owners are unknown, the same shall be entered accordingly, with a description of such lots or premises as is required by law in assessment rolls made by supervisors of townships, with the value thereof and the amount assessed therein, which assessment roll shall then be returned and filed with the recorder of said city.

SEC. 58. Upon such return being made and filed, the recorder of said city shall cause notice thereof to be published in one or more papers of said city, stating the names of the persons assessed, or, in cases of non-residents and owners whose names are unknown, a brief description of the premises taxed shall be inserted, and that at a certain time and place to be designated in said notice the common council will meet and review said assessment roll on the request of any person conceiving himself aggrieved.

SEC. 59. The common council shall, at the time and place in said notice specified or at some session thereafter, take said assessment into consideration, and may rectify or amend said assessment roll in whole or in part or may set the same aside

and direct a new assessment, or they may ratify and confirm such assessment without any corrections, or with such corrections therein as they may think proper; and when such assessment roll shall be completed and ratified and confirmed by the council, a majority of the members elect concurring, the recorder shall endorse thereon or annex thereto his certificate that such assessment roll Certificate. was ratified and confirmed by the common council, and the date of such confirmation.

final.

levy and collect.

SEC. 60. Every assessment so ratified and confirmed by the Assessment common council, as aforesaid, shall be final, and conclusive, and the same shall remain and continue a lien upon the premises assessed for such tax. Within ten days after such assessment Warrant. shall have been ratified and confirmed, the mayor and recorder or either of them shall affix to such assessment and tax roll a warrant for the collection thereof, signed by him or them under the seal of said city, directed to the treasurer of the city, commanding him to collect the same within a time in said warrant to be specified, not less than thirty nor more than ninety days from the date of said warrant; and the said assessment and tax roll, Authorizing to with said warrant annexed, shall be delivered to said treasurer within the ten days aforesaid, who shall within the time mentioned in said warrant, or within such further time as the common council shall allow, be authorized to levy and collect the same by distress and sale of the personal property of any person chargeable with said tax; and in case sufficient personal property Return. cannot be found whereon to levy and collect such tax, the treasurer shall, within five days after the time prescribed and limited for the collection thereof has expired, make a return under oath to the recorder of the sums so remaining unpaid, which he is unable for the want of such personal property to levy and collect the same, together with the description of the premises assessed for such unpaid taxes; and the recorder shall within ten days thereafter certify under his hand to the supervisor the amount of such unpaid taxes and a description of the premises assessed and chargeable with such tax, who shall assess such unpaid taxes Re-assessed in on such premises in the general tax roll next thereafter made, and general tax roll. such tax shall then be levied, collected and returned, and the said premises may be sold for the non-payment thereof, as prescribed

by law for the non-payment of the ordinary city taxes.

laws.

SEC. 61. The common council, a majority of the members Power of counelect concurring, shall have power to make all such by-laws and ell to make byordinances relative to any special assessment or tax in said city as they may deem necessary to levy and collect such tax, in all cases when the manner of levying and collecting such tax is not provided for in this act: Provided, That such by-laws and ordi- Proviso. nances are not inconsistent with any of the provisions of this act: And provided also, That whenever any person shall be improperly Further designated as the owner or occupant of any lot or premises in proviso. proceedings under this act, or any of the by-laws and ordinances of said city relative to any special assessment, shall not for that cause be vitiated, but the same shall be a lien upon such lot or premises, and as such lien shall be collected as in other cases.

Dangerous buildings, etc.

Drainage.

Proviso as to cost.

Further proviso.

Sections amended.

First election.

SEC. 62. Whenever in the opinion of the common council any building, fence, or other erection of any kind, or any part thereof, is liable to fall down, and persons and property may be thereby endangered, they may order any owner or occupant of the premises on which such building, fence, or other erection stands, to take down the same or any part thereof within a reasonable time, to be fixed by the order, or immediately, as the case may require; or in case the order is not complied with may immediately cause the same to be taken down at the expense of the city and assess the expenses on the land on which it stood; the order, if not immediate in its terms, may be served on any occupant of the premises or to be published in one or more papers as the common council shall direct.

SEC. 63. The common council of said city shall have power to drain or to regulate the drainage of all swamps, marshes and wet lands within the corporate limits thereof; and they may assess the cost of said drainage in whole or in part upon the lands directly benefited thereby, to be collected in the same manner provided for the collection of local taxes assessed for local benefits: Provided, That the costs so assessed for drainage purposes shall not in any one year exceed five per cent of the assessed valuation of said land for the preceding year. Said common council shall also have the same powers to act in concert with the officers of adjoining townships in regard to drainage as are now or may hereafter be provided by law for adjoining townships: Provided, That the mayor, recorder and supervisor, under the direction of the common council, may act as its committee for that purpose. This act is ordered to take immediate effect. Approved March 4, 1887.

[No. 374.]

AN ACT to amend sections two, four, nine, twelve, twenty-five and thirty-six of an act entitled "An act to incorporate the village of Ovid," approved March twenty-fourth, eighteen hundred and sixty-nine, being act number three hundred and fortysix of the session laws of eighteen hundred and sixty-nine.

SECTION 1. The People of the State of Michigan enact, That sections two, four, nine, twelve, twenty-five and thirty-six of an act entitled "An act to incorporate the village of Ovid," approved March twenty-fourth, eighteen hundred and sixty-nine, being act number three hundred and forty-six of the session laws of eighteen hundred and sixty-nine, be and the same are hereby amended so as to read as follows:

SEC. 2. The male inhabitants of said village having the qualifications of electors under the constitution of the State shall at their next annual election elect by a plurality of votes, by ballot, one president, one recorder, one treasurer, one assessor, terms of office. and a village marshal, who shall hold their respective offices for

Officers and

the term of one year and until their successors shall be elected and qualified, and three trustees who shall hold their offices for the term of two years and until their successors shall be elected and qualified, and annually thereafter on the second Monday of Subsequent April there shall be elected by plurality of votes one president, elections, etc. one recorder, one treasurer, one assessor, and a village marshal, who shall hold their respective offices for the term of one year and until their successors shall be elected and qualified, and three trustees who shall hold their offices for the term of two years and until their successors shall be elected and qualified: Provided, Proviso. That if an election of such officers shall not be made on said second Monday of April, it shall be lawful to hold such election at any time by giving notice thereof as provided in this act. The polls of such election shall be opened at nine o'clock in the forenoon, or as soon thereafter as may be, and shall be continued open until four o'clock of the same day and no longer.

officers.

SEC. 4. The common council shall appoint annually a village Council to apattorney and may also appoint one or more street commissioners, point certain and all such other officers whose election is not herein specially provided for as they may deem necessary to carry into effect the powers granted by this act, and may prescribe their duties, but any such appointment shall be made at a regular meeting of the common council.

council to

SEC. 9. The common council shall have power to remove from Power of office any officer appointed by them for any violation of the pro- remove, etc. visions of this act, or of any ordinance or by-law of said village, or for refusing to perform the lawful requirements of said council, but such removal shall not exonerate any such officer or his sureties from any liability incurred.

filled.

SEC. 12. In case a vacancy shall occur in the office of presi- Vacancies, how dent, trustee, recorder, treasurer, assessor or village marshal, the same may be supplied by a special election or by appointment by the common council and in all other cases of vacancy the same shall be supplied by the appointment of the common council.

SEC. 25. The village recorder shall safely keep the corporate Duties of seal and the books, papers and files belonging to said village and recorder. shall make a record of all the proceedings of the common council, whose meetings it shall be his duty to attend, and shall make a record of all ordinances and by-laws passed by the common council in proper books to be provided therefor; and copies of all papers duly filed in his office, and transcripts from the records of the proceedings of the common council certified by him, with or without the corporate seal of the village, shall be evidence in all courts and places of the matters therein contained, and he shall prepare accurate account, in books provided for such purpose, under appropriate heads, of all expenditures and of all orders drawn upon the village treasury, which account shall specify the purposes for which such orders were drawn: Provided, That in Proviso. case of the death or inability of the recorder or vacancy of the office of recorder his duties may be performed by the president or president pro tempore of said village until said vacancy shall be filled.

Power of council relative to streets, lanes, etc.

property for public uses.

tiate for, etc.

case of refusal to sell.

SEC. 36. The common council shall have power and authority to lay out, open and extend, widen, straighten, alter, close, vacate and improve such streets, highways, alleys, lanes, watercourses, squares, market-places, and public parks in said village as they shall deem necessary for the public good and convenTaking private ience; and if in the opening thereof the property or lands of any person shall be required for such purpose the common council shall so declare by resolution, stating therein the description of the lands, premises or property required, and the purposes for which the same are to be used, and that the common council will meet on some day to be named in the resolution to take action in regard to the matter, and notice of such meeting shall be given to the owners or parties interested, or his, her or their agents, or representatives, by personal service of a copy of such resolution or by publication of a copy of such resolution in a newspaper published in said village, at least three weeks previous to the time appointed in said resolution for the meeting of the comCouncil to nego- mon council; and the common council is hereby authorized to negotiate with the person or persons interested in or owning such grounds or premises for the same and to pay therefor such reaProceedings in sonable sum as may be agreed upon; but if such person shall refuse to negotiate for such land or premises or if for any other cause there shall not be any agreement or bargain between the parties therefor, it shall be lawful for the common council, at the time of the meeting appointed in such resolution, to direct the village recorder to issue a precept, under his hand, in the nature of a venire facias, directed to the marshal of said village or any constable in the county of Clinton, commanding him to summon a jury of twelve disinterested freeholders of said village to appear before any justice of the peace therein named, of the township of Ovid, in said village, at a time therein to be stated, to inquire into and determine the necessity for taking such property for public use and the just compensation to be made therefor; said jury shall all be present and acting together during the proceedings, and before acting shall take and subscribe an oath that they will justly and impartially ascertain and determine the necessity of taking and using any such real estate or property for To determine public use for the purposes proposed; and if they deem the same necessary to be taken will ascertain and determine the damages or compensation which ought justly to be made by said village to the owners or persons interested in said property. This report and determination of said jury shall be made in writing and signed by each of said jurors and delivered to said justice of the peace; and the said justice, upon the report and determination so made, shall enter judgment confirming the same and the sum or sums assessed as damages, compensation and costs, together with his, her or their costs, shall be paid or tendered to the party or persons entitled thereto, if residing in said village, and if not residing therein to be paid to the village treasurer for the use of such party, person or claimant before such street, highway, lane, alley, water-course, square, market place or public park shall be

Jury.

Oath of.

damages.

Report.

Compensation to owner, etc.