Chap. 5.—An ACT to amend and re-enact sections 6, 11, 14 and 17 of an act
approved March 15, 1906, entitled an act to provide for the consolidation
or annexation of cities.

Approved January 31, 1910.

1. Be it enacted by the general assembly of Virginia, That sections
six, eleven, fourteen and seventeen of the act entitled an act to provide
for the consolidation or annexation of cities, approved March fifteenth,
nineteen hundred and six, be amended and re-enacted so as to read as
follows:

§6. The consolidation or annexation ordinance shall not be voted on by
the council of either of the cities interested in the proposed consolidation
or annexation (unless by its terms the proposed consolidation or annexa-
tion is made dependent upon an election) until notice thereof shall have
been given by publication of such ordinance once a day for five successive
days, in at least one daily newspaper published in each of said cities, or if
there be no such newspaper published in said cities, or in either of them,
then in some daily newspaper which has a substantial circulation in the
city or cities in which no such newspaper is published. A printed copy
of said consolidation or annexation ordinance shall be posted conspicu-
ously throughout said cities in not less than one hundred public places, in
each city, including each voting precinct of said cities, at least ten days
before the council is called upon to vote thereon. Both thé publication
and the posted notice herein required shall be signed by the clerk of the
council, and shall designate the day upon which the council will proceed
to consider said ordinance.

$11. In case the ordinance prepared by the committees of the councils
of said cities shall be passed by the council of one of said cities and be re-
jected or so amended by the council of the other city as to be unaccepta-
bl: to the council of the first city, or in case it shall be vetoed by the mayor
of one city and be adopted by the council of the other, a special election
may be called for in the city whose council so amends or rejects said
ordinance or by whose mayor it is so vetoed in the manner provided in
section five hundred and eighty-one of the Code of Virginia, to determine
whether the ordinance reported by said committees shall or shall not be
effective. In case such ordinance is ratified by the qualified voters of said
city at such election, after having been adopted by the council of the
other city, the proposed consolidation and annexation shall be as effec-
tive as if the councils of the two cities had themselves agreed upon its
terms.

§14. Notice may be served by either city upon the mayor, president of
the city council, or of its more numerous branch, where there are two,
and upon the city attorney of the other city named in the ordinances, and
by publication at least five times in some newspaper published in or hav-
ing substantial circulation in the city having the smaller population as
aforesaid, that within ten days, and on a day named, it will move the said
corporation court, or the judge in vacation, to hear the case and to ascer-
tain and declare by order of court that all preliminary acts and condi-
tions precedent have been complied with, and that consolidation or annex-
ation has been effected by the said cities according to law; or in the event
that the consolidation or annexation ordinance requires an election to be
held in either of said cities, or in both of them, that the corporation court
of each city in which an election is required will be asked to order the
same to be held on a named day, not less than fifteen nor more than thirty
days after the entry of the order, and that the corporation court of the
city having the smaller population, as aforesaid, will be asked at the same
time to ascertain and declare by order of court that all other prelimi-
nary acts and conditions precedent in said ordinance have been complied
with, and that consolidation or annexation has been effected by the said
cities, according to law, subject to ratification or rejection by the qualified
voters at the election or elections prescribed in said ordinance.

§17. Upon the complaint of one hundred or more qualified voters of
the city in which an election is held made to the corporation court, or
judge thereof, within ten days after said election, of any undue election or
false returns, such election shall be subject to inquiry, determination and
judgment of the said court or judge. The complaint shall fully set out
the grounds of contest, and if any votes were improperly received or re-
jected, shall give a list of said votes, with objections to the action of the
judges of election in receiving or rejecting the same. Five of the persons
making the complaint shall make oath that the facts therein contained
are true to the best of their knowledge and belief. Such notice shall be
served upon the city attorneys of the two cities, stating that the com-
plaint has been filed in the clerk’s office of the said court. If it be de-
sired to take-depositions, the time and place of taking the same shall be
stated in said notice, which shall entitle the parties giving the same to
take the depositions, which may be read as evidence in said contest, in
case the witness is unable to attend the trial and testify: provided, how-
ever, that the taking of such depositions shall begin within five days from
the service of such notice and shall not be adjourned for more than one
day at a time until completed; and, provided, that the taking of deposi-
tions shall be closed by the person before whom they are taken as to any
person who fails to produce witnesses in his behalf at the time and place
named in the notice, after having been granted a continuance of one day
for that purpose, unless the court or judge reopens the taking of deposi-
tions as to such person. Either or both of said cities may file an answer
to said complaint, and the proceedings in said contest shall be conducted
as near as may be in accordance with the provisions of the act of the gen-
eral assembly of Virginia, approved November twenty-eighth, nineteen
hundred and three, providing for contesting local option elections (acts
nineteen hundred and two, nineteen hundred and three and nineteen hun-
dred and four, page five hundred and forty-five) as the same may be from
time to time amended. The said court, or judge thereof, shall proceed
to pass upon said complaint without a jury, and on such depositions as
may have been taken under the notices aforesaid and upon such other
legal testimony as may be adduced by either party at the hearing of the
case. If it be determined that such election should be set aside, the court
or judge shall so declare and order a new election to be held, which he
shall also do in any subsequent contest until there has been a legal elec-
tion for the purpose aforesaid.

2. It being desirable that the cities of this Commonwealth be given
the opportunity to consolidate according to the provisions of this act be-
fore the taking of the United States census of nineteen hundred and ten,
and the time for doing so being limited, an emergency is hereby declared
to exist, and this act shall take effect from its passage.