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case the entire cost of grading, improving, maintaining, repairing, cleaning and sprinkling of such streets shall be borne by and be assessable against the property fronting or bordering thereon, and the approval of said board shall so recite; but said board shall require, in both cases last above enumerated, that all such streets and alleys be made safely passable before the map or plat making such sub-division and dedication shall be approved, recorded or accepted.

Private Places.-No map or plat embracing a private place shall be approved unless it conveys to the city the right to place, construct and maintain in such private place, sewers, sewer inlets, water mains, gas mains, underground conduits for electric wires, fire plugs, lamp posts and other conveniences for the public service and use of the city.

Boulevards, Conditions for the Establishment.-The Municipal Assembly may, by ordinance recommended by the Board of Public Improvements, establish and open boulevards, or change existing streets into boulevards, and fix the width thereof, and the manner of laying out and improving the same; and may regulate the traffic thereon, and may exclude heavy driving thereon or any kind of vehicle therefrom, and may exclude and prohibit the erection or establishment or maintenance of any business house, or the carrying on of any business vocation on the property fronting on such boulevard, and may establish a building line to which all buildings, fences, or other structures thereon shall conform. And may provide for grading, improving, constructing, reconstructing, maintaining, cleaning, sprinkling, the planting of trees, shrubbery and other things of that description and nature thereon, and the entire cost connected with all of said work on such boulevards shall be levied, assessed and collected as a special tax on the property fronting or bordering on such boulevard in the proportion that the linear feet of each lot fronting or bordering on the boulevard bears to the total number of linear feet of all property fronting or bordering on the same, and the work of maintaining, repairing, cleaning and sprinkling may be contracted for annually, or for a term of years not exceeding ten, by the Board of Public Improvements of the city at such time, and under such terms and

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conditions as shall be provided by ordinance, to be recommended by said board, and special tax bills for all work shall be made out in the name of the contractor and delivered to him, and his receipt taken for all claims against the city in the same manner as provided by this Charter for other special tax bills, for doing public work: provided, that the special tax bills for maintaining, repairing, cleaning and sprinkling shall be levied and assessed annually. All such special tax bills shall be prima facie evidence of the liability of the property charged therewith to the extent and amount therein specified. The Municipal Assembly shall not grant any franchise for the occupancy or use of such boulevard or any part thereof, except with the consent, in writing, of the owners of two-thirds in frontage of the property fronting or bordering thereon; provided, however, that for the establishment and opening of such boulevards, the procedure set out in this article in reference to opening streets shall be pursued, except that the benefit district to be established by the commissioners shall be limited to the property fronting or bordering on such boulevard, and except that adequate compensation shall be allowed the owners of property fronting or bordering thereon, for damages occasioned by the establishment of a building line on such boulevard, and by limiting the use to which such property may be put by the owners thereof.

Discontinuance of Boulevards. --The Municipal Assembly may at any time repeal any ordinance establishing or opening a boulevard, or changing an existing street into a boulevard, and thereupon such boulevard shall be and become a street in all respects like other streets of the city and the property abutting thereon shall be relieved from the restrictions imposed by such ordinance; provided, however, that such an ordinance shall not be repealed without the consent in writing of the owners of at least two-thirds in frontage of all the property fronting on such boulevard, nor unless such repeal shall be recommended by the Board of Public Improvements; and, provided further, that the procedure provided in this article for the establishing and opening of boulevards shall be pursued for the ascertainment and payment of damages and

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benefits resulting from such repeal; except that no compensation shall be allowed or paid to any person consenting to the repeal of such an ordinance.

*SEC. 2. Form of Petition-Commissioners to Assess Damages-Parties Defendant.-Whenever the Assembly shall provide, by ordinance, for establishing, opening, widening or altering any street, avenue, alley, wharf, market place or public square, or route for a sewer, water course or water pipe, or for other public improvements, on recommendation of the Board of Public Improvements, and it becomes necessary for that purpose to appropriate private, property, the City Counselor, in the name of the City of St. Louis, shall apply to the Circuit Court of the Eighth Judicial Circuit, or to any one of the judges in vacation, by petition setting forth the general nature of the improvement proposed to be made, the names of the owners of the several lots or parcels of land, if known, or if unknown, a correct description of the parcels whose owners are unknown, and praying the appointment of three disinterested commissioners, freeholders of property in said city, to assess the damages which said owners may severally sustain by reason of the appropriation and condemnation of such real estate by the city, for any of the purposes aforesaid, to which petition the owners of such lots or parcels of land embraced in the proposed improvement shall be made parties defendant by name, if the names are known, and by description of the land of unknown owners. If the proceedings seek to affect the lands of persons under guardianship, the guardians must be made parties defendant; if the lands of married women, their husbands must be made parties defendant. If the possessor of land to be affected has an estate less than a fee, the person having the next vested estate in remainder or reversion must, if known, be made a party defendant. It shall not be necessary to make any persons parties defendant in respect to their ownership, unless they are in actual possession of the premises to be affected, or have a title to the premises appearing of record upon the proper records of the city.

*This section is an amendment to the Charter, adopted at the charter amendment election held on October 22, 1901.

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SEC. 3. Notice to Defendants-Process to Be Served by City Marshal-Notice by Publication.-Upon the filing of the petition, a summons shall be issued, giving such defendants at least ten days' notice of the time when said petition will be heard, which summons shall be served by the Marshal-who shall, for such purpose, be ex-officio an officer of the Circuit Court-in the name and manner as writs of summons are, or may be, by law required to be served. If the name or residence of the owner be unknown, or if the owners, or any of them, do not reside within the State, notice of the time of the hearing the petition, reciting the substance of the petition, and the day fixed for the hearing thereof, shall be given by publication for four weeks, consecutively, prior to the time of the hearing the petition, in the newspapers publishing the journal of the Assembly.

*SEC. 4. Court Shall Appoint Three Freeholders as Commissioners, to Assess Damages; Qualifications-Majority May Act and Report.-The court, or a judge thereof, in vacation, on being satisfied that due notice of the pending of the petition has been given, shall appoint three disinterested commissioners, freeholders of property in said city, and residents of the city for five years next preceding their appointment, to assess the damages which the owners of the land may severally sustain by reason of such appropriation. Provided, however, that a majority of said commissioners shall have full power and authority to act and make a report.

*SEC. 5. Duty of Commissioners as to Damages and Benefits-Assessment of Benefits to Be a Lien Against Property-Opening of Alleys.-It shall be the duty of the commissioners to ascertain the actual value of the land and premises proposed to be taken, without reference to the projected improvement, and to ascertain the actual damages done to the property thereby, and for the payment of such values and damages to assess against the city the amount of benefit to the public generally, and the balance against the owner or owners of all property which shall be especially benefited by

*This section is an amendment to the Charter, adopted at the Charter amendment election held on October 22, 1901.

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the proposed improvement in the opinion of the commissioners, to the amount that each lot of said owner shall be benefited by the improvement. The sums to be paid by the owners of property especially benefited by the improvement, as ascertained by the commissioners, shall, when the report of the commissioners shall be confirmed by the court, as hereinafter provided, be primia facie evidence of the liability of the property charged therewith to the extent and amount therein specified, and shall be and remain until paid, a lien from the date of the final judgment of the Circuit Court on the property so charged, and shall be collected as provided by ordinance, and when collected shall be paid into the city treasury as a separate fund to be used exclusively for the payment of the damages awarded; provided; however, that in the opening of an alley the benefits shall be paid by the owners of such lots in the block in which the alley is opened as are afforded access by such alley.

SEC. 6. Commissioners' Report to Be Under Oath-Damages and Benefits to Be Separately Stated.-When the Commissioners shall have viewed the property, and assessed the value and damages and benefits, they shall make their return of such assessment, in writing and under oath, to the Circuit Court, which shall be filed by the clerk thereof. In making such report, the value and damages allowed to each owner, and the benefits assessed against each individual shall be separately stated.

SEC. 7. Report May Be Reviewed on Exceptions-Court May Order New Appraisement, Etc.-The report of said Commissioners may be reviewed by the Circuit Court on written exceptions filed by either party, in the Clerk's office, within ten days after the filing of such report, and the Court shall make such order thercin as right and justice may require, and may order a new appraisement upon good cause shown; but the hearing of such exceptions shall be summary, and the Court shall fix a day therefor without delay, upon the filing of any such exceptions, or within ten days after the expiration of the time given said city to report the same to the Assembly as hereinafter provided.