Agreement

ting.

the manner provided by law for the payment of existing debts all such taxes and assessments as shall be necessary to carry such agreement into full effect, provided, that the affirmative vote of at least two-thirds of the whole number of trustees elected shall be necessary to the final ratification of any such agreement and to the imposition of any tax or assessment required for the purpose. In case no settlement or compromise satisfactory to the trustees can be so made, they are hereby authorised and empowered to treat and enter into an agreement with any person or parties concerned, for a reference of the matters in dispute to William W. Campbell of the city of New York, who is hereby appointed a general referee for that purpose.

§ 2. Section nine of the said act is hereby amended so as to read as follows:

§ 9. Every agreement for such reference shall be in writing, to be in wri- under seal, and executed by as many of the parties interested in the matter or matters in dispute as can be induced to unite therein, and shall be filed in the office of the clerk of the county of Kings, and thereupon an order shall be entered in the supreme court, referring the matters in controversy to such general referee.

And filed

clerk.

§ 3. Section fifteen of the said act is hereby amended so as to read as follows:

$ 15. Whenever the matter in controversy between the parwith county ties to any agreement for a compromise or for a reference shall embrace the legality of any proceedings in the opening of any street, such agreement for a compromise or report of the reference shall be filed with the clerk of the said village, and also with the clerk of the county of Kings, and thereupon such street shall be held to have been legally opened to all intents and purposes as against all the parties to such agreement or reference, their heirs or assigns.

Duration of office of referee.

Costs.

Time limit ed.

§ 4. Section seventeen of the said act is hereby amended so as to read as follows:

§ 17. The said general referee shall continue in office for the purposes contemplated by this act until the first day of May, one thousand eight hundred and fifty-one, and shall have power to close and determine any of the aforesaid matters or business brought before him previous to that time. In case of his death, or refusal, incapacity, or inability to serve, it shall be the duty of the supreme court, or any justice thereof acting within the county of Kings, on the application of the trustees of the said village to appoint a competent and suitable person in his place, and on further application to fill any vacancy that may happen from like

causes.

§ 5. On any such reference costs may be awarded in the discretion of the referee to and against the parties concerned.

§ 6. Any person or party having any unsettled, disputed matter or claims of a date prior to the passage of this act against the trustees of the village of Williamsburgh, growing out of their ac

tion upon any street or well or pump in said village, or arising on village account, who shall refuse upon written request, on six months notice, as hereinafter provided, to enter into an agreement for a compromise and settlement or for a reference, as provided by the eighth section of said act as hereby amended, and shall not within one year after such refusal commence and diligently prosecute some suit or proceeding in a competent court, for a determination of the matter or claim in controversy or dispute, shall from and after the expiration of such year be forever barred and precluded from bringing any suit or instituting proceeding against the said trustees in relation to said matters or claims, provided, however, that in case any person having such unsettled matters or claims, shall at the time of the service or publication of said notice be either within the age of twenty-one years, or insane, or imprisoned on a criminal charge, or in execution under the sentence of a criminal court for a term less than his natural life, or a married woman, such person shall be at liberty to commence such suit or proceeding within one year after such disability shall be removed, and not afterwards.

written re

meet

§ 7. The said trustees may serve upon any person or party Trustees having any unsettled matter or claim against said trustees, specifi- may serve ed in the last preceding section, a written request to meet the parties with said trustees at a time and place to be specified in said notice, for quest to the purpose of entering into an agreement for a compromise and settlement, or for a reference as provided by the said eighth section of said act as hereby amended; or they may, and where no such written request shall have been served, they are hereby directed to cause a notice to be published in one or more newspapers of said village employed by said corporation; also in one or more newspapers published in the city of New-York, and also in the state paper, once in each week for at least six months, which notice shall, in substance, request all persons having any unsettled matter or claim, prior to the date of the passage of this act, against the trustees of said village, growing out of the action of said trustees upon any street or well and pump in said village, or arising on village account, to meet the said trustees at a time and place to be specified in said notice, which shall be at least six months from and after the said first publication of said notice, for the purpose of entering into an agreement for a compromise and settlement of said matters or claims, or for a reference thereof to the aforesaid general referee; and that in case the said persons, or any of them, having such matters or claims, shall refuse to enter into one or the other of said agreements, and shall not, within one year after such refusal, commence and diligently prosecute some suit or proceeding in a competent court, for a determination of the matter or claim in controversy or dispute, they and each of them shall, from and after the expiration of such year, be barred and precluded from bringing any suit or proceeding against the said trustees, in relation to said matters or claims. Affidavit of the service of such written request personally upon any of the

Regulated

streets.

Accounts to be kept.

Act to be

said persons, or by depositing the same in the post office, directed to the said persons, at their place of residence, or of the publication of said notice, is hereby declared to be sufficient proof of such service or publication.

§ 8. All streets and parts of streets in said village, which have heretofore been opened and regulated therein by order of the trustees, and used as such streets for ten years last past, shall hereafter remain as opened and regulated streets, notwithstanding there may have been some errors or informalities in the proceedings of said trustees relating thereto..

9. The said trustees shall open accounts with the streets and well and pump districts therein respectively, and shall assess and collect upon the property within the several assessment districts thereof, so much or such part of the moneys required to settle or discharge any claims or demand referred to in this act, as the said trustees shall deem just and equitable to be charged thereon, and in the assessment thereof regard shall be had to such lots of land upon which an assessment shall have been paid, and such as shall not have been paid, so as to charge the greater amount thereof upon such lands for which no assessment has been paid, with a view of equalizing, as nearly as may be, the expenses of the improvements.

§ 10. This act, together with the tenth, eleventh, twelfth, thirpublished. teenth, fourteenth, sixteenth, eighteenth, nineteenth, and twentieth sections of the act hereby amended, shall be published by the trustees of said village in all the newspapers employed by said corporation, and they shall furnish to any party with whom they purpose a settlement in pursuance of this act, if demanded, a copy of such publication.

§ 11. This act shall take effect immediately.

Chap. 166.

AN ACT to amend an act entitled "An act to consolidate and amend the act to incorporate the city of Buffalo," passed April 20, 1832, and the various acts amendatory thereof passed April 17, 1843.

Passed March 29, 1849, "three fifths being present." The People of the State of New-York, represented in Senate and Assembly, do enact as follows:

§ 1. The eleventh section of the second title of the act entitled "An act to consolidate and amend the act to incorporate the city of Buffalo," passed April 20, 1832, and the various acts amendatory thereof, passed April 17, 1843, is hereby amended, and shall read as follows:

council to

other off

§ 11. The common council shall on the second Tuesday of Common March in each year, or as soon thereafter as practicable, appoint appoint city by ballot a city clerk, treasurer, city attorney, superintendent of cond common schools, street commissioner, one or more assistants to cers. the street commissioner, one or more collectors of city taxes and assessments, one or more clerks of the market, so many overseers of the poor, not exceeding one for each ward, and so many sealers of weights and measures, pound keepers, sextons and keepers of burial grounds, as the council shall deem proper.

§2. The twelfth section of the said second title is hereby amended, and shall read as follows:

stables,

§ 12. The common council may also at any time in its discre- Police contion appoint by ballot not more than ten police constables, a comp-comptroller troller and three auditors with whom the comptroller and clerk and auditors. may be associated, and they shall constitute a board of auditors, and the common council shall prescribe as well the duties of the said board of auditors as that of the other officers named in this section, and may vest exclusively in the comptroller any financial power or duty by this act imposed on or confided to any officer of the city, but a comptroller shall not be appointed except by a vote of at least two-thirds of the aldermen elected, and the common council shall cause to be paid to the auditors so as aforesaid by it appointed, such compensation for their services as shall be reasonable and just, not exceeding three dollars per day for each day's service actually performed by them, and said common council may also at any time in their discretion provide for the appointment of a deputy comptroller and deputy clerk and in like manner prescribe their duties.

§ 3. The twenty-second section of the said second title is hereby amended, and shall read as follows:

§ 22. All officers appointed or elected under this title, except Tenure of justices of the peace and aldermen, shall hold their respective office. offices until the second Tuesday of the month of March next after such appointment or election, unless sooner removed or disqualified, and until their respective successors in office shall be appointed or elected and enter upon their respective duties. The aldermen elected on the first Tuesday of March in the year one thousand eight hundred and fifty, shall be classified so that one of the aldermen from each ward then elected shall hold the office for two years; such classification shall be by lot to be drawn by the clerk of the city in the presence of the common council of the preceding year, at their usual place of meeting, immediately after the completion of the canvass of the votes given at the charter election for the year one thousand eight hundred and fifty, as prescribed by the ninth section of the said title. A certificate of said drawing and classification shall be made in duplicate signed by the mayor and clerk of the city, one of which shall be filed with the clerk of the city, and the other with the clerk of Erie county. The classes shall be numbered one and two, according to term of service of each, the class having the shortest

Oaths to be administer

ed.

Accounts

time to serve being number one; and the term of office of those so drawn in class number one shall be for one year, and of those drawn in class number two for two years, and thereafter there shall be one alderman elected in each ward annually, whose term of office shall be for two years, unless sooner removed or disqualified, and until their respective successors in office shall be elected and enter upon their office.

§ 4. Section twenty-three of the third title of this act, is hereby amended so as to read as follows:

§ 23. The mayor or the chairman of any committee or special committee of the common council or any member of the board of auditors shall have power, to administer any oaths or take any affidavit in respect to any matter pending before the council or such committee or board of auditors.

§ 5. The first section of the fifth title of the said act is hereby amended, and shall read as follows:

§ 1. The common council shall examine, settle, and allow, all how settled. accounts chargeable against the city as well of its officers as of other persons; but may in its discretion vest in the board of auditors the power to examine, settle and allow, any or all such accounts, subject to the approval of the common council.

Money to be raised by

tax.

§ 6. The third section of the said fifth title is hereby amended,

and shall read as follows:

§ 3. The common council shall direct and cause a sum not exceeding twenty-five thousand dollars, unless as hereinafter provided, for defraying all the contingent and other expenses of the city, not herein otherwise specially provided for, to be raised annually by general tax, and may add to, and include in, such tax, such other and further sums as may be necessary to support the free schools of the city as provided in section five of title nine of this act, and also to pay the principal and interest or such part of the principal and interest of any debt due from the city for moneys borrowed by this act, or any special acts that have been, or may hereafter be passed for that purpose, as shall be due, or fall due within eighteen months after the laying of any such tax, and also an additional sum not exceeding five per cent upon the whole amount thus authorised to be raised to defray the cost of collection, and the said common council are hereby further authorised, should the same be ordered by a vote of at least two thirds of all the aldermen elected, to add annually after the year one thousand eight hundred and forty-nine to the amount heretofore authorised to be raised to defray the contingent and other expenses of the city a sum not exceeding two thousand dollars until the whole sum thus authorised to be raised for such purposes shall amount to thirty-five thousand dollars and no more; the moneys directed to be raised by this section may be raised as a gross tax on one assessment roll, without specifying on such roll the funds to which said moneys belong; but the common council shall by resolution, to be entered in their minutes at the time of directing the amount of the annual general tax, declare what sum