Chap. 329.—An ACT to provide for the contraction of the corporate limits of
cities and towns.

_ Approved November 28, 1903.

1. Be it enacted by the general assembly of Virginia, That whenever
it is deemed desirable to contract the corporate limits of any city or town
the council thereof may enact an ordinance defining accurately the boun-
dary of the territory proposed to be stricken off, and such ordinance shall
thereupon be published in at least ten issues of the paper published in and
having the largest circulation in said city or town, if there be such a
paper, and shall be conspicuously posted in at least ten public places in
said territory. A copy of said ordinance shall also be served by such city
or town upon the board of supervisors of the contiguous county or coun-
ties of which such territory may become a part.

2. Thirty days after the enactment of an ordinance proposing to re-
duce the corporate limits of a city or town, the city or town shall apply
to the circuit court of the city, or to the circuit court for the city or town,
for an order confirming said ordinance, or to the judge thereof in vaca-
tion. One or more residents or frecholders of the territory proposed to
be stricken off, or the attorney for the Commonwealth of the county or
counties contiguous thereto, may appear and by petition set forth reasons
why the corporate limits should not be reduced.

3. If the court or the judge thereof, as the case may be, shall be satis-
fied that such contraction of the corporate limits will not leave the bonded
debt of the city or town in excess of eighteen per centum of the assessed
valuation of the real estate that will be left in the city or town aftcr the
contraction proposed, which shall be determined as is provided in section
one hundred and twenty-seven of the Constitution of Virginia, and if the
said court or judge shall be satisfied that less than three-fourths of the
freeholders in said territory oppose the contraction proposed, and that
no substantial injury to persons owning real estate in the territory pro-
posed to be stricken off, or to the county of which it will become a part,
will be caused thereby, but that the striking off of such territorv will be
for the interest of the city or town, the said court or judge, as the case
may be, shall render an order confirming said ordinance contracting the
limits of the city or town, and declaring the territory so stricken off to
be a part of some contiguous county designated in the order. Said con-
traction shall thereupon become final and be taken cognizance of by all
public officers, and the territory so stricken off shall become a part of the
county so designated; and the proper city officers shall thereupon certify
to the county clerk of the county a list of all real estate within said terri-
tory, with every entry in regard thereto, as it appears on the land books,
by whom said list and entrics shall be entered upon the county land books.

Every registered voter in said territory shall be entitled, without again
registering, to a transfer and to vote at his proper precinct in the county
to which the territory is annexed, or to register and vote at said precinct
if he was entitled to register and vote in said city or town, or if he would
have been entitled to register and vote in said county had the territory of
which he is a resident always been a part of the county and never a part
of an incorporated city or town.
The said order, if rendered in vacation, shall be certified to the clerk
of ‘the court and be by him entered as if rendered in term.
5. This act shall be in force from its passage.