Chapter 146 of the Public Acts of 1909, which took effect on July 15th of that year, required towns to assume the management and control of their district schools and also to take over their property and indebtedness. Section 7 of the Act provided that the assessors of each town should appraise the property of each school district therein on or before September 30th, 1909, and that the town, at its next annual meeting after the Act took effect, should levy an "equalization tax" upon its grand list sufficient to raise, in the combined districts, an amount equal to the value of their property less their indebtedness; and that thereupon a sum equal to the appraised value of the school property in each district, less its indebtedness, should be abated to the taxpayers of such district in proportion to the amount of their respective lists. It further provided that any school district might elect to retain and be alone responsible for its own indebtedness or any stated portion thereof, in which case such indebtedness should not be deducted from the appraised value of its property in determining the amount of the aforesaid abatement. The plaintiff district, which owned property appraised, in September, 1909, at $15,500, and was indebted to the amount of $15,152, voted that its entire debt devolve upon the town; while the defendant town voted in November, 1909, not to assume any debt contracted by any school district before July 15th, 1909. The defendant refused to lay an equalization tax and the plaintiff by this suit sought to compel it to do so, or to return, or pay for, the school district property. Held: — 1. That the object of the tax was not to raise money to pay the indebtedness assumed, but, as its name implied, to equalize, between the different districts and in proportion to their respective grand lists, the amount in property and taxes taken from each by the town. 2. That the town, in its corporate capacity, had no interest in the appraisal of the school district property but only in the amount of its indebtedness; and therefore was in no position to assail the statute upon the ground that it did not provide for a hearing of interested persons by the assessors before appraising the property. 3. That as none of the defendant's property was being taken there was no ground for its claim that it was being deprived of its property without due process of law. 4. That the defendant should have laid the equalization tax as the statute prescribed; and its failure to do so at the time specified in the statute was no excuse for its refusal to lay it now. 5. That the tax should be laid upon the last completed grand list of the town.
THAYER, J.
The purpose of the statute under which the plaintiff's school property was vested in the defendant, was to abolish school districts in certain towns and place the management of all the schools in the hands of the town, which, for that purpose, is made a school district. Its effect is to enlarge the boundaries of the different districts so as to make them correspond with those of the town. It is a general law, applying to all towns in the State except those which have a city or borough, or a district organized under a special act of the legislature, within their limits, and except those towns which have voted to abolish school districts and assume the control of the schools.
By thus consolidating all of the districts into a single district, the enlarged district became possessed of the school property of all the old districts, and became bound to manage, and assume the expense of managing, all the schools. Section 7, out of which the present controversy arises, provides for the payment of the debts and obligations of the districts. After providing, in the earlier part of the section, that the town shall pay these debts except as thereafter provided, it proceeds to provide for what is called an "equalization tax." This tax does not purport to be laid for the purpose of paying the indebtedness which the town assumes to pay for the different districts. The sum to be raised is not the amount of such indebtedness, but the value of the property received less the amount of such indebtedness. It may be much more than the total indebtedness, and it may be less, depending upon the value of the property and the amount of the indebtedness of the different districts. Presumably the total property taken will exceed the indebtedness; but fires or other disasters in a particular town might create a situation not contemplated by the statute. Nor does the statute contemplate that the town will, upon this levy, collect the full tax laid, for the taxpayers in the several districts are allowed an abatement which in effect is the amount by which the appraised value of the property taken from the district exceeds its indebtedness.
The purpose of the tax is, as its name implies, equalization, to equalize as between the different districts, in proportion to their grand lists, the amount in property and taxes taken from each by the town. If the amount thus received is not sufficient to pay all the indebtedness assumed by the town, the difference must be raised later by a new levy upon all the taxpayers in the town in the usual manner of raising money by taxation.
The defendant, therefore, as a corporate body, has no interest in the valuation of the school property. For that reason, doubtless, the appraisal was left to its own officers chosen to appraise and assess all of the taxable property in town, and already chosen at the time the Act was passed and the property taken over. It is the amount of the indebtedness in which the town is interested, and it has adequate means of raising the necessary amount if the equalization tax fails to produce sufficient. Whether the appraisal of the school properties was too great or too small does not affect the defendant. In the case before us the court has found that the plaintiff's property was properly appraised, its value being the amount of the appraisal, $15,500. It is unnecessary, therefore, to inquire whether it was, as claimed by the defendant, improper to leave the appraisal of the school property to the assessors of the town without providing for a hearing by the parties interested, because the defendant is not an interested party. And as none of the defendant's property is being taken, there is no ground for its claim that it is being deprived of its property without due process of law.
It was the defendant's duty to have levied this equalization tax as the statute required. It is claimed in behalf of the defendant that, having neglected its duty to levy the tax at its next town meeting after the statute was passed, it cannot now levy such a tax because property has changed hands, new buildings have been erected, and no provision is made in the Act for laying the tax at any other time than at the annual town meeting for 1909 upon the grand list for that year. The statute does not prescribe that the levy shall be upon the grand list of 1909. For aught that appears it might have been laid upon the last completed grand list as well as upon that of 1909. The law made it mandatory upon the town to pay the indebtedness of the districts, and provided a way. The defendant cannot be heard to say that because it neglected its duty at the time prescribed for its performance it is now excused from performance. A levy upon the last grand list, or upon the next one, will answer the purposes of the statute.
The plaintiff district having never determined that any stated amount of its indebtedness shall be owed by it exclusively and shall not be devolved upon the town, this is not a case where both the district and town have acted in fixing such stated amounts. The plaintiff, therefore, is not precluded by the votes of the town from bringing this action.
The Superior Court is advised to grant the plaintiff's first prayer for relief, directing that the equalization tax be levied upon the last completed grand list of the town.