The total payments, as given by the report of the Treasurer to the City Council, which accompanies this document, were as follows, viz.: On account of the City of Boston, $19,320,382 39 On account of the County of Suffolk, 272,342 38 $19,592,724 77 Add the drafts of the Auditor of Accounts of 1870-71 on the Treasurer, not paid, 59,593 83 $19,652,318 60 From which, deduct the amount paid by the Treasurer on the Auditor's drafts, drawn in 1869-70, We have the total payments by the Auditor, as on the preceding page, 9,000 00 $19,643,318 60 The Treasurer's report shows that the balance of cash in the treasury, May 1, 1870, was Total receipts during the year $1,229,727 19 To this cash balance should be added the amount advanced on authorized loans not negotiated by the Treasurer, as shown under the head of the Treasurer's balance, We have the actual balance of the Treasurer, 193,519 93 $2,749,016 06 This balance of $2,749,016.06 is subject to the following payments, viz.: Balances of unexpended appropriations for uncompleted works, &c., carried to the financial year 1871-72, Temporary loan of 1869-70, not paid, Water Debt falling due 1870-71, drawn for by the Auditor, but not paid, City Hospital, balance of two trust funds, Total balance belonging to the Treasury as given on page 6, $2,588,852 31 100,000 00 59,000 00 1,163 75 $2,749,016 06 An important and judicious step was taken by the City Council of last year in relation to the finances of the city, by which a complete separation of the sinking funds for. the redemption of the debt of the city, from the balances in the Treasury, has taken place, and a new board of management of said funds created. The fact having been ascertained at the time the measure providing a new order of things in a financial point of view, was before the City Council of last year, that the sinking funds, with their prospective additions and accumulations, would meet the payment of the whole debt of our city then outstanding, nearly $24,000,000, at maturity, without further taxation of the three per cent on the capital of the debt as then required by the ordinance in relation to finance, led to the new legislation and the passage of an ordinance in addition to the ordinance concerning finance, approved by the Mayor, Dec. 24, 1870. These sinking funds have been obtained, and the payment of our debts secured without burdensome taxation, and the provisions of the new ordinance, we confidently believe, will work to the advantage of the taxpayer at an opportune moment, maintain the financial stability of our growing aud prosperous municipality, and preserve our high standard of credit. The provisions of this ordinance are given in detail in another part of this report under the head of "Sinking Funds for the Redemption of the Debt." The Board of Commissioners on the Sinking Funds, created by the ordinance, as now constituted, consists of the Mayor, William Gaston (Chairman); the City Treasurer. F. U. Tracy; the Auditor of Accounts, Alfred T. Turner (Secretary); the Chairman of the Joint Committee on Accounts, Alderman Henry L. Pierce; the Chairman of the Committee on Finance on the part of the Common Council, Wm. Pope; Newton Talbot and John O. Peor, elected by the City Council from the citizens at large. The Board was organized February 15, 1871, and the control of the sinking funds for the payment of the City Debt, assumed by them in accor dance with the terms of the ordinance by which they were created. By the terms of the ordinance, no balances remain in the City Treasury, proper, belonging to the Board of Commissioners on the Sinking Funds. The funds remaining in the Treasurer's hands as reported by him, are the actual balances belonging to the various undertakings for which appropriations have been made and which remain uncompleted. One of the first steps taken by the Board of Commissioners was to notify the City Council that there would be no taxation required, on account of the debt of nearly $24,000,000, as it existed at the date of their communication February 27, 1871, and only a tax of $77,625 this year, on account of loans authorized but not then negotiated, being a saving on account of taxation for the payment of the debt, as compared with the previous year, of $641,375. The balances of the business of 1870-71, paid by the City Treasurer to the Board of Commissioners on the Sinking Funds, will relieve taxation entirely on the capital of the debt next year, with a surplus for said board to purchase old or new debt as they shall determine. The aggregate debt of the city of all kinds, April 30, 1871, was funded $26,472,916.80 (including a renewal of a Water Loan of $688,000, as authorized by the City Council); unfunded, $193,519.93; total, $26,666,436.73. The means on hand for the redemption of said debt at maturity are as fol lows: sinking funds, $10,711,259.83; bonds in the Treasury secured by lands sold for which said bonds were given, betterment and other bonds, $921,700.08; total, $11,632,959.91. Net debt, $15,033,476.82. This shows an increase of the gross debt of $4,848,024.80, and of the net debt of $2,430,896.14, since April 30, 1870. The sinking funds show a net increase of $2,555,309.20, and there has been a decrease of the bonds. on hand compared with April 30, 1870, of $137,181.54. The total assessment of C:TY and COUNTY TAXES for 1870, to meet the deficiency in the income during the financial year 1870-71, and to pay the State Tax levied on the city of Boston Tax payments into the City Treasury, to April 30, During the summer of 1870, a census of the city was taken by the United States authorities, by which it appears that our population at that time was 250,526, a number much below that estimated in the Auditor's last report, and not up to what it is thought it would have been had the census been taken late in the fall of the year, when that portion of our citizens who enjoy the summer months in the country, would have been at home. The increase of our population by this census is 19,059 since 1865, and 37,718 since 1860. THE DEBT OF THE CITY. The sterling loan of £800,000, negotiated by the Treasurer in London, in January, 1870, with Messrs. Baring Bros. & Co., at 87 per cent, netted the Treasury in currency $3,823,415.89. The amount of the funded debt of the City, of all kinds, May 1, 1870, was Add amount of Bonds issued on account of City and Water Loans, during the year 1870-71, Less amount of debt paid during the year 1870-71, $18,687,350 91 8,761,415 89 $27,448,766 80 975,850 00 Total funded debt of the City, April 30, 1871, $26,472,916 80 Add unfunded debt, being advances made by the Treasurer on loans authorized by City Council, but not negotiated, Total funded and unfunded debt, April 30, 1871, 193,519 93 $26,666,436 73 The indebtedness, as stated above, the Auditor classifies as follows, viz.: City Debt, proper, Water Debt (net cost of the Water Works), War Debt, Roxbury Debt, Dorchester Debt,. Total, as above, The Water Loans outstanding April 30, $6,482,711 11; but the real debt of the $14,666,690 09 9,219,896 64 1,914,500 00 663,850 00 201,500 00 $26,666,436 73 1871, amount to Water Works is shown by the excess of the expenditures for said works over the revenue derived from the same, which is, as stated above, $9,219,896.64. |