Chap. 94.—An ACT to amend and re-enact subsection 10 of section 2 of an act
entitled an act to provide a new charter for the city of Roanoke and to repeal
the existing charter of said city and the several acts amendatory thereof
and all other acts or parts of acts inconsistent with this act so far as they
relate to the city of Roanoke, approved March 22, 1924, page 720 of acts
1924, so as to empower the city of Roanoke to remedy and prevent water
companies from providing or furnishing improper water supply to the in-
habitants of the city and to define the procedure in connection therewith.

[S B 27]
Approved March 5, 1928

1. Be it enacted by the general assembly of Virginia, That
subsection ten of section two of an act entitled an act to provide a
new charter for the city of Roanoke and to repeal the existing
charter of said city and the several acts amendatory thereof and
all other acts or parts of acts inconsistent with this act so far as
they relate to the city of Roanoke, approved March twenty-second,
nineteen hundred and twenty-four, be amended and re-enacted so
as to read as follows:

Section 2: subsection 10. To establish and enforce water rates
and rates and charges for public utilities or other service, products
or conveniences operated, rendered or furnished by the city; to
employ necessary competent inspectors to inspect the reservoirs,
watersheds, filtering plants, pumps and pumping machinery and
all other equipment of and all sources of water supply of every
water company furnishing such water for domestic purposes, 01
use in the homes, of the inhabitants of the city; to compel any
such water company which owns or operates such reservoirs
watersheds, filtering plants, pumps and pumping machinery ot
other equipment or source or sources of said water supply to pay
the reasonable cost of such inspectors; to give reasonable notice
to any such water company of any condition disclosed by any suck
inspection which, in the opinion of said inspector and of a majority
of the city council renders, or unless remedied probably will render
the said water or water supply of the city or its inhabitants or any
part thereof dangerous or unfit to be used for drinking purposes or
general domestic purposes and to require any such water company
to remedy any such condition within a reasonable time to be stated
in said notice; to specify in said notice the particular acts or
things which are required to be done by any such water company
to remedy or prevent any such condition of said water or water
supply ; and if said condition be not remedied by said water com-
pany and the acts and things specified in said notice to said water
company to be done by it, be not done within the time specified in
said notice, and if a majority of said city council shall by resolu-
tion at a meeting of said council of which said water company has
had reasonable notice and opportunity to produce evidence and be
heard, declare that an emergency exists requiring the doing of said
acts or things, so specified in said notice or any part of them, to
remedy or prevent such unfit water or water supply being provided
tor or furnished to the inhabitants of the city, or any of them,
then the city council is hereby empowered and it shall be its duty
immediately to do the acts or things so specified in said notice to
said water company, and in said emergency resolution, and said
city council shall have the power and it shall be its duty, either by
withholding the water rentals which may thereafter become due
trom the city to said water company, to reimburse the city for any
amount expended in the doing of said acts or things, or to recover
said amount from said water company by any appropriate action
at law or suit in equity; provided, however, that the maximum
amount which the said city may so expend in any calendar half
year period, between January first and June thirtieth, or between
July first and December thirty-first, shall not exceed the sum of
seven thousand and five hundred dollars; and provided further,
that any such water company shall have the right by proper legal
proceedings to have determined whether or not any such expendi-
ture which may have been so made by said city was made through
abuse of discretion or without probable cause to believe said ex-
penditure a necessary one for the protection of the city’s water
supply; and if in any such proceeding it shall be finally deter-
mined that said expenditure was one not necessary for said pur-
pose, said water company shall recover from the city any water
rentals which may have been retained as a reimbursement for said
expenditure; and provided, further, that if-said expenditure be
found not a necessary one the city shall be entitled to receive from
said water company by reason of said expenditure only such
amount as tnder a quantum meruit it may be determined the said
water company has received actual benefit of and and in justice
ought to pay value received for. Permitting the growth of algae
in an amount which materially affects the purity, taste or smell
of such water so as to render the same unfit for drinking purposes
or general domestic use, in the reservoirs or sources of water
supply is hereby declared a condition which it is the duty of the
city council to prevent or remedy under the powers granted in
this subsection. Nothing herein contained shall be construed as
in any wise limiting, altering, affecting or impairing the existing
duties, jurisdiction or powers of the State corporation commis-
sion or of the State board of health or any other agency of the
State over water companies in the city of Roanoke or elsewhere, but
any existing powers, duties or jurisdiction of the State corporation
commission, State board of health or other agency of the State
which are hereby conferred or imposed upon the city council, shall
be deemed to be concurrent.

2. An emergency existing. this act shall be in force from its
passage.