Chap. 447.—An ACT to amend and re-enact section 2854 of the Code of Vir-
ginia, as amended by an act approved March 16, 1920. [H B 136]

Approved March 27, 1922.

1. Be it enacted by the general assembly of Virginia, That sec-
tion twenty-eight hundred and fifty-four of the Code of Virginia,
as amended by an act approved March sixteenth, nineteen hundred
and twenty, be amended and re-enacted so as to read as follows:

Sec. 2854. Courthouse, clerk’s office and jail to be provided by
supervisors and council; offices for certain other officers may be
provided; vacant rooms may be let for offices and provisions made
for public entertainments; buildings may be leased for private pur-
poses, or used for market houses or other public purposes.——There
shall be provided by the board of supervisors for every county and
the council for every city a courthouse, clerk’s office and jail, the
cost thereof, and of the land on which they may be, and of keeping
in the same in good order, shall be chargeable to the county or city ;
the fee simple of the lands shall be in the county or city, and the
supervisors of the county or the council of the city, may purchase
so much land, as, with what it has, will make two acres, whereof
what may be necessary for the purpose, shall be occupied with the
courthouse, clerk’s office and jail and the residue planted with trees
and kept as a place for the people of the county or city to meet and
confer together. But the board of supervisors of any county may,
if they deem it expedient, acquire, in addition to the two acres afore-
mentioned, as much as ten acres of land, at any point within their
county to be used for agricultural and school fair purposes, or the
council of each city shall, if there be offices in the courthouses of
the respective counties and cities, available for such purposes, pro-
vide offices for the treasurer, Commonwealth’s attorney, sheriff, com-
missioner of the revenue, commissioner of accounts and division
superintendent of schools for such county or city, and if such offices
are not available in the courthouse, same may be provided by said
board of supervisors or council, if they deem it proper, elsewhere
than in the courthouse of said county or city; and with the approval
of the judge of the circuit or corporation court, any vacant rooms
in the courthouse, after furnishing offices to the said officers, may
be rented for a term of not exceeding one year to other parties for
office purposes, and any public room or hall in the building may be
hired for compensation for the purpose of giving public entertain-
ments, and all moneys received by the counties or cities under this
section, shall constitute a fund to maintain and care for such building.
Furthermore, where the board of supervisors of any county or the
council or other governing body of any city, in providing land for
the courthouse, clerk’s office, and jail purposes, has purchased land,
a part of which had valuable buildings thereon when purchased
and that portion of the land so occupied by such buildings is, in
the discretion of such board, council, or other governing body, not
required for said purposes, such board, council, or other governing
body, if deemed proper by it, may either lease such building or
buildings for private purposes, or remodel and use the same for a
market-house or for other public purposes, or both, although such
lease or use may- reduce the total to less than two acres, and although
as much as two acres may never have been acquired, but such lease
or use shall be first approved by the judge of the circuit court of the
county, or of the corporation court of the city, as the case may be,
and such lease or use shall be terminated when, in the opinion
of such judge such building or buildings, or the land occupied by
same, is needed for the purposes of a courthouse, clerk’s office or
jail,

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