[§46-74.2]  Public land or land exempt fromtaxation, etc.; cost otherwise assessable against borne by city andcounty.  Whenever (1) any public land, except lands owned by the board ofwater supply, or (2) any land by law exempted from improvement assessments, or(3) any land exempted by law from payment of property taxes which land is ownedby a society, association, or corporation engaged in religious, charitable,educational, scientific, literary, or other benevolent purposes, whose charteror other enabling act contains a provision that, in the event of dissolution,the land owned by such society, association, or corporation and herein exemptedfrom assessments shall be distributed to another society, association, orcorporation engaged in religious, charitable, educational, scientific,literary, or other benevolent purposes, forms part of any improvement districtor fronts upon any street, alley, or other highway to be opened or improved oralong which a storm drainage system or street lighting system is to beconstructed or improved independently and would, if privately owned or notexempt from such assessment, be subject to assessment, the city council shall,nevertheless, without assessing such public or exempted land for any part ofthe cost of such improvements, by general ordinance appropriate and pay towardsuch improvements out of general revenues the portion of the cost thereof whichwould otherwise be assessable against the same in a lump sum or, at theelection of the council, in such equal installments and with such interestthereon as the council shall determine.  In the event, however, any part orparts of such exempt lands as described in the preceding sentence, exceptpublic lands, may be required for right-of-way or easement purposes within suchimprovement districts the value thereof shall be chargeable to the improvementdistrict, and upon acquisition the owner shall be compensated therefor in thefollowing manner:

(1)  Where the value of the part taken together withany severance damages exceeds the portion of the cost of the improvements whichwould otherwise be assessable against the exempt land, the county shall pay thedifference to the owner or owners;

(2)  Where the value is less than the portion of thecost of improvements which would otherwise be assessable against such exemptlands, the value of the land shall be deducted therefrom and the county shallpay the balance of the assessment as provided herein.

With respect to any proposed improvement where anypart of the cost is thus to be borne by the city and county, the council shallhave the same right of approval or protest as though the city and county werethe private owner of the public or exempted land so involved.  As to suchexpenditures for public and exempt lands, the city and county shall be entitledto be reimbursed out of state revenues by appropriations to be made from timeto time by the legislature to the extent of fifty per cent of all assessmentsregularly apportioned against persons, corporations, or entities, which arepart of any improvement district or frontage improvement and are exempted bylaw from the payment of such assessments.  The city and county shall beentitled to be likewise reimbursed for the full amount of assessments regularlyapportioned against public lands which are a part of any improvement districtor frontage improvement, which public lands are owned in fee simple by theUnited States, or by the State, and which are not set aside for city and countyparks, or for other city and county purposes or for street areas or frontages;provided that as to the University of Hawaii, Kapiolani park, including theWaikiki parks established by the laws of 1905, chapter 103, section 1, the cityand county shall be entitled to full reimbursement for improvement assessments;and provided further that in case any land exempted by law from assessments asherein provided, other than public land, or any part thereof, is sold or leasedafter the establishment of a frontage improvement or an improvement district, thegrantee, in the one case and the lessor in the other, shall assume the paymentof assessments from the date of such sale or lease in the same manner as if theproperty had not been exempted from assessments and as if assessmentsproportionable against the property had been paid in installments to such dateof sale or lease; and that all payments received from such grantee or lessor,as the case may be, shall be paid into the permanent improvement fund.  Nothingin this section shall be taken to prejudice any rights of the State toreimbursement from the United States for assessments herein assumed by theState, but the latter shall be subrogated to the rights of the city and countyon such assessments so assumed. [L 1919, c 241, pt of §2; RL 1925, §1852; am L1925, c 191, §2; am L 1929, c 110, §1; am L 1932 2d, c 69, §1; RL 1935, §3183;RL 1945, §6704; am L 1949, c 267, §1(3); am L 1953, c 263, §1(2); RL 1955,§153-3; am L 1957, c 240, §2(2) and c 248, §1; am imp L 1965, c 97, §1; am L1965, c 228, §1; HRS §70-111; ren L 1988, c 263, §7]

 

Cross References

 

  Waiver of exemption, see §46-74.

 

Case Notes

 

Decisions prior to 1988.

  Nature and scope of county's obligation to improvementdistrict bondholders regarding assessment collections.  323 F. Supp. 666.

  Cited:  32 H. 803, 809.