[no source, no date]
TNT Site Price Twice
Value
Tax Assessment Put at
$350,000; Estimate Cost at 2 to 3 Million
Some land
owners near Weldon Springs who sold their property to the War Department for
the site of the TNT plant, received from two to three times the assessed
valuation of the land, it was disclosed by records at St.
Charles yesterday.
The records
show Birch O. Mahaffey, wealthy St. Louis
oil operator, who owned 165 acres overlooking the Missouri River,
was paid $41,441.05 for the tract, which had an assessed valuation of $1570.
County
Collector William Bruns of St.
Charles County
said the assessed value of land in the county for tax purposes is 35 to 40 per
cent of the actual valuation.
Bruns
yesterday began studying tax records at St. Charles
showing the assessed valuations of 123 parcels of land on which R. Newton
McDowell, Kansas City contractor,
has been allowed fees of 5 per cent by the government on the total purchase
price.
$350,000 ASSESSMENTS
The County
Collector estimated the assessed valuation of the approximately 16,000 acres
being acquired for the project at $350,000, and that the actual valuation was
approximately $1,000,000. McDowell in making his first estimates of what it
would cost the government to acquire the site placed the cost at $2,000,000 to
$3,000,000.
It was
disclosed in Washington the
Federal Department of Justice is making an investigation of the fees obtained
by McDowell for acquisition of the land, and McDowell had been notified to come
to Washington to report on the
purchase of the site. He was advised February 17 the Department of Justice
wishes to question him at Kansas City
about the land purchases. At that time McDowell informed the department he had
made previous arrangements to go to Newfoundland
to bid on work there in connection with the construction of the newly acquired
defense bases, so he was advised to stop in Washington
on his return to this country.
It was
learned at St. Charles yesterday
three residents of the county are making appraisals of land acquired for the
plant site at the request of the Department of Justice. They are John Nadler, a
Matson farmer; William Wehmeyer of Orchard Farm and George Dierker. They
started making their appraisals the early part of this week.
==========
[no source, February
22, 1941]
UNDERCOVER PROBE
By Associated Press
WASHINGTON,
February 22.—A searching undercover investigation of land prices charged the
government for defense projects was disclosed today in an announcement that for
the second time fees of War Department land agents had been slashed.
The Justice
Department indicated the investigation centered on nine scattered tracts bought
under pressure for speed for such purposes as sites for arms plants and army
ordnance proving grounds.
Commercial
agents were employed by the Quartermaster General to obtain these tracts by
direct purchase. It was the fees paid some of these agents that were reduced,
with Norman M. Littell, Assistant Attorney General in charge of the Justice
Department’s Lands Division, contending that they were “exhorbitant.”
Paul M.
McCord, Indianapolis, land agent in
the acquisition of some 60,000 acres in Southern Indiana
for an artillery proving ground, agreed at a conference with officials to
reduce his fees from 6½ to 3½ per cent.
CUTS ABSTRACT FEES
At the same
time Willis N. Coval, president of the Union Title Company, Indianapolis,
agreed to a flat fee of $50 as an abstract charge for each of some 600 tracts
purchased, irrespective of size. Previous charges ranged upward to $820, it was
stated.
Earlier the
fees and charges of agents buying land for an arms plant at Burlington,
Ia., were reduced from 6½ to 3½ per cent
for all expenses.
The fees as
well as prices paid for sites for the nine projects for which agents were
employed have been under investigation for several weeks, Littell said,
indicating that other downward revisions were in prospect.
Included in
the nine were an ordnance plant site at Weldon Springs,
Mo., and a shell loading plant at La
Porte, Ind., but Littell
declined to disclose the full list.
In the 12
months ending next June 30, the War Department is undertaking the purchase of
3,980,000 acres estimated to cost $47,260,000.
==========
[no source, no date]
TNT CONTRACTOR
—Staff Photo
R. Newton McDowell, Kansas City
contractor who acquired the 16,000-acre site for the proposed TNT plant in St.
Charles County,
shown yesterday as he dictated a lengthy statement defending the appraisal he
and his staff made of the land.
