The Council of said City shall have the following general powers enumerated in the subdivisions of this section as follows:
(1) To lay off, open, close, vacate or maintain public grounds, parks, public places, name and rename the same, to have control and supervision thereover, to protect the same from damage or other injury by persons or property, to fix fines and punishments for any injury thereto in violation of any of the orders of said Council, and to maintain good order and prevent violations of the ordinances of said City therein or thereon.
(2) To establish, maintain and regulate free public libraries and reading rooms and to purchase books, papers, maps, manuscripts and other proper things therefor, to receive donations and bequests of money or property for the same, in trust or otherwise, and to pay the necessary expenses for establishing, maintaining and regulating the same out of the funds for general purposes; provided, such expenditure shall not exceed one hundred dollars ($100.00) per annum unless by unanimous vote of all the members of the Council.
(3) To protect divine worship within the limits of said City, and to fix fines and punishment for disturbance of any assemblage of people, then and there, met for the worship of God, to prohibit any interference with or disturbance of divine worship or an assemblage of people met together for the worship of God by any person or persons loitering about the premises or places where such worship is being had or such assemblage is met, or from loitering in the public streets or public places adjacent thereto in such manner as to interrupt such worship.
(4) To acquire either by purchase, condemnation or any other modes provided by general law, ground within said City for such streets and alleys as the Council may deem proper; to locate, lay off, vacate, close, open, alter, grade, straighten, widen or narrow, pave or repave, construct and keep in good repair, the roads, streets, alleys, pavements, sidewalks, crosswalks, drains, viaducts and gutters therein, and such bridges as may be owned or built by the said City, for the use of the public or of any of the citizens thereof, and to improve and light the same and to keep the same clean and free from obstruction of every kind; provided, the Municipality shall not be liable for, or responsible in damages for injuries to persons or property caused by or from any defect or obstruction in or on any street or alley within said City, that has been or may be taken over by the State Road Commission, under and by virtue of the laws of this State; nor shall said Municipality be liable in damages for injuries to persons or property caused by or from a defect or obstruction in or on the plat of ground between the gutter or curb of any street and the paved or plank sidewalks extending there along or between any such sidewalks and the property lying next adjacent thereto, unless the Municipality had actual notice of such defect or obstruction prior to the time of the injury complained of; and, provided, further, that where said City shall be required to respond in damages by reason of injury to persons or property occasioned by the failure of any abutting owner to so provide or keep in repair any sidewalk along such property, after being notified by the Council so to do, that such property owner shall be liable to the City for any sum of money, costs and counsel fees which it has been required to pay by reason thereof.
(5) To regulate the width of sidewalks and the streets and the width and the care of public grounds or grass plots abutting thereon, and to order the sidewalks, footways, crossways, drains and gutters to be curbed, paved, or repaved and kept in good order, free and clean, and to provide for the removal of snow and ice therefrom, and for sprinkling the same by the owners or occupants of the real property next adjacent thereto, and to provide and enforce punishments for obstructing, injuring or preventing the free and proper use thereof, and to provide and enforce fines and penalties for throwing therein or thereupon any paper, glass, rubbish, decaying substances or other things that would make said streets, sidewalks, grass plots, crosswalks, drains, or gutters unsightly or unhealthy.
(6) To regulate the use of the walks, highways, bridges, streets, alleys and gutters and the rate of speed of travel thereon, and to prevent and punish for fast riding or driving thereon of any horse, bicycle, wheeled vehicle, wagon, steam or electric or traction engine, motor car or automobile and to prevent injury to such streets, alleys, roads and highways from overloaded or improperly loaded vehicles, and from dragging logs or other matter therein, and to regulate the speed of engines or trains or streetcars upon or across any such streets, alleys, highways, bridges, public places or any other place where the Council deems the public safety requires such regulation.
(7) To regulate the planting, trimming and preservation of shade trees, by persons and by corporations, in streets, alleys, roads, public grounds and places, and shall require the owner of adjacent property to trim or remove any shade tree or ornamental shrubbery or other tree that in the opinion of the Council is an obstruction to the streets, alleys, or sidewalks, or a menace to public safety.
(8) The Council shall have the right to require the owner or occupier of any property in the City to keep his premises clean and free from all matters that would endanger the health of the City, and may require the removal of any wastepaper or waste material of any kind or character upon the private property of any citizen or property owner that would cause the spread of fire or when the Council deems the same should be removed; and may require the removal or straightening of any fence, wire, railings, or other material enclosing any lot, when, in the opinion of the Council, the same is dangerous or obstructs or encroaches upon the streets, alleys or sidewalks; provided, that in all such cases, if the owner or occupier of such property fails to do any of the things enumerated in this section required by the Council, after notice by the Council, the Council may take such action as may be necessary to perform such acts and the expense thereof shall be charged to the property owner and collected as taxes are collected.
(9) To regulate the making of division fences of an unsightly nature and property walls by the owners of adjoining and adjacent premises and lots, insofar as the same shall not be in conflict with the general law.
(10) To regulate or require drainage by the owner or occupier of any lot or other real estate, by proper drains, ditches, and sewers, and to require the owner or occupier of any lot to fill the same, at his own expense, so that water will not collect in a body thereon, or so the same will not become a menace to public health.
(11) To regulate or prohibit street carnivals, or street fairs, or street parades, advertising exhibitions thereon, or the exhibition of goods, wares, merchandise, material or artificial curiosities upon any street, sidewalk, alley or public place of the said Town.
(12) To regulate or prohibit the ringing of bells, blowing of steam whistles, or use of hand organs, or other instruments of any annoying character, or other music of itinerant performers in the streets, or public speaking and preaching in the streets, roads, parks, or public places of the Municipality.
(13) To license, regulate or prohibit auctioneering.
(14) To license, regulate or prohibit the sale of goods, wares, merchandise, drugs or medicine on the streets or other public places.
(15) To prevent the illegal sale, offering or exposing for sale, or advertising of spiritous liquors, wine, porter, ale, beer, or drinks of a like nature.
(16) To prevent the illegal sale of tobacco, cigars, snuff, or cigarettes, within said Municipality, and to prevent the smoking, by any person under twenty-one years of age of any cigarette, in any public building or upon any public grounds, street, alley, sidewalk or public place within said City, and to fix fines and punishments for violations thereof.
(17) To regulate, control or prohibit runners for hotels, boardinghouses and eating houses, and to regulate draymen or persons hauling or transporting for hire at and about the railroad depots and stations and other public places and in an assemblage of people within the said City.
(18) To regulate, assess and collect a license fee for the said City for the doing of anything or business on which a State license is required, subject to the exceptions provided by general law.
(19) To provide, assess and collect a license tax from residents in said City who own and operate or run an automobile therein, or from any person, whether a resident of said City or not, who shall run or operate an automobile for hire, or keep the same for hire within said City; provided, that any person, not a resident of said City, who shall run or operate an automobile in said City, not for hire, for a longer period than one month at any time, shall pay the license tax assessed against resident automobile owners.
(20) To establish, when the Council may deem proper, locate and keep in repair, market places, market houses, and regulate markets, prescribe the time for holding the same, to authorize the seizure thereat and destruction of any and all such food and drink products, as shall be found unwholesome, dangerous or offensive, and without recourse against the Municipality for its cost or value.
(21) To regulate the sale of food and drink products, milk, fresh meats, fish and vegetables, and to provide penalties for the sale of any such that are unwholesome and unfit for use.
(22) To regulate and provide for the weighing of hay, coal and other articles for sale in the markets, or to residents of said City.
(23) To require the merchants and other persons selling goods, foods or materials that must be weighed, to keep correct scales, to seize and destroy such as are found to be incorrect, and not corrected after due and proper notice to the owner or person using the same, without damage or expense to the Municipality for the value thereof.
(24) To prevent injury or annoyance to the public or individuals from anything dangerous, offensive or unwholesome.
(25) To regulate the keeping, handling and transportation of explosives and dangerous combustibles within the Municipality; and to regulate or prohibit the use of firecrackers, skyrockets, toy pistols, air rifles or guns, within said Municipality.
(26) To regulate or prohibit the erection or operation, or maintenance in what the Council deems an improper locality within said City, any blacksmith shop, livery stable, barn, stable, cattle pen, poultry house, pigpen, privy, billboard, signboard, gas or other engine, coal mine, coal plant, or coal bin, or any other thing that may in the opinion of the Council be a menace to persons or property or public safety, or that would injure private property or annoy citizens of said City.
(27) To regulate or prohibit the use of walls or walks for signs; to regulate or prevent the distribution or posting of any sign, bill or other paper that, in the opinion of the Council or Mayor, is indecent or immoral.
(28) To define by ordinance what shall constitute a nuisance, and to abate all nuisances whether defined or not, and to require the removal or abatement of any building, obnoxious business, signboard, billboard signs, or other thing, which in the opinion of Council is a nuisance.
(29) To regulate or prohibit the distribution of handbills, circulars and other advertisements of like kind, on the streets, roads, alleys and public places, or the placing the same in private yards, buildings or other structures, without having first procured the consent of the owner or occupier of such property.
(30) To regulate or prohibit within the Municipality or within one mile of its corporate limits, the erection or maintenance of any slaughterhouse, soap factory, glue factory, lampblack factory, tannery, or other house, shop or factory of like kind or character.
(31) To establish within said Municipality public drinking fountains and water troughs; and to regulate the time and place and manner of bathing in pools, streams and public waters within the police jurisdiction of said Municipal corporation.
(32) To prevent hogs, cattle, sheep, horses, and other animals and fowl of all kinds, from going at large in the Municipality and to establish and maintain places for their detention, make regulations respecting the same, appoint a pound master and define his duties and provide for the sale of such property impounded.
(33) To arrest, convict and punish any person for committing adultery or fornication, or for any lewd or lascivious cohabitation within said City, and for keeping an assignation house, house of ill fame, or for leasing or letting to another person any house or other building to be kept or used as such, or for knowingly permitting any house, under the control or owned by any person, to be used as an assignation house or house of ill fame; and to convict and punish for frequenting, entering or loitering in any assignation house or house of ill fame within said Municipality.
(34) To arrest, convict and punish any person for importing, printing, publishing, selling, giving away, exhibiting, or distributing any book, picture or device, or other thing containing any obscene picture or language, or making any indecent representation.
(35) To restrain, convict and punish vagrants, mendicants, beggars, tramps, common prostitutes, and their associates, and drunken or disorderly persons within the Municipality, and to provide for their arrest and manner of punishment.
(36) To prevent and prohibit the use of indecent or profane language within the corporate limits, and to provide and fix punishment therefor.
(37) To prevent and prohibit any tumult, riot, quarrel, angry contention, abusive language, and to prevent the use of insulting epithets, assaults, assault and battery, and fix fines and punishments therefor.
(38) To prevent and prohibit trespass upon private property or the doing of anything which would annoy the occupier of any premises, and to fix and provide fines and punishments therefor.
(39) To provide against danger or damages by fire, and to that end, to require, when the Council may think necessary, an inspection of all the properties within the said City, and to require the owner or occupier of any property in which a defective or dangerous chimney or flue is found, to immediately repair the same, and to prevent the use thereof until repaired as required.
(40) To prohibit and prevent intoxication or drunkenness, and the drinking of intoxicants in any public place, store, street, or alley, and to fix fines and penalties therefor.
(41) To prohibit and punish for larceny where the amount stolen is less than twenty dollars.
(42) To prohibit, prevent and punish for anything that is against the good morals and common decency, or that would tend to corrupt, vice or crime.
(43) To protect the public schools in said City, and to prohibit and prevent any disturbance thereof in and about the buildings or upon the grounds, and to prevent injury, destruction or defacement of any school property or building.
(44) To establish a board of health and vest it with the necessary power to maintain its object, and to fix fines and penalties for any violation of its lawful orders.
(45) To establish quarantine, and to erect and maintain pest houses and places of detention, and to make and enforce necessary orders for controlling or preventing the spread of infectious and contagious diseases and for abating pestilences.
(46) To prohibit the bringing into the corporate limits by railroads, carrier, persons, or in any manner, persons, who are paupers or persons who are afflicted with contagious diseases; to punish by fine or imprisonment, or both, any person who shall bring into the corporate limits any such pauper or person afflicted with contagious disease, knowing or having reason to believe, at the time that such person is a pauper or afflicted with such contagious disease, and to collect and recover from any such railroad company, carrier, or other person, the expense of keeping and maintaining such pauper or diseased person, until such person can be lawfully removed from the corporate limits.
(47) To provide for the poor of the Municipality, and to that end, the Municipality may contract with County Court of Barbour County, for keeping of such poor person, or any number of them, at the County poorhouse, at a price and on such terms as may be agreed upon between the County Court and the proper Municipal authorities.
(48) To authorize the taking up and providing for the maintenance and safekeeping, and educating of (for such period as may be deemed expedient) all children within said City who are destitute of proper parental and other care.
(49) To arrest, convict and punish any person for cruelty, unnecessary or needlessly beating, torturing, mutilating, killing or overloading, overdriving, or wilfully depriving necessary substance, any horse or other domestic animal.
(50) To regulate the hitching of horses within the corporate limits, and the driving of cows and cattle through, upon and along the streets and alleys of the said City.
(51) To prohibit, prevent and punish for the pollution of any stream of water running into or through the said Municipality; and to prohibit and prevent the throwing into any such stream of any trash, dirt, filth, offal, decayed substances or matters, or anything that would make said water unhealthy or unfit for domestic use.
(52) To prohibit, prevent and punish for any desecration of the Sabbath day; prohibit the playing of any game, exhibiting any show, theater picture show, and the keeping open of business places, except hotels, eating houses, boardinghouses, restaurants, drugstores and places where ice cream or soft drinks are furnished.
(53) To restrain, prevent and punish fraudulent practices of any kind or character within the Municipality.
(54) To arrest, convict and punish any person for gambling or keeping any gaming table, commonly called “faro bank”, or table and chips used in playing such game; crap table, chips or dice used in playing such game; or roulette or the wheel, chips, or other equipment used in playing such game; or keno table or table of like kind or device used in playing the same; or table of like kind under any denomination, whether the game or games be played with cards, dice or otherwise on which anything is bet or wagered, whether the same be playing in any public or private room or residence; and may convict and punish any person who shall be a partner or concerned or interested in the keeping of such gambling devices theretofore enumerated, or in any game played, such as is prohibited hereby, or in keeping or maintaining any gambling house or place of gambling for money or anything of value; and. shall have the right to destroy such gambling paraphernalia as may be found in use on any such premises; and any officer armed with a warrant for the arrest of any person engaged in any such unlawful game or for the search of any room in which gambling is suspected, or for the seizure of any gambling paraphernalia, shall have the right to break into any building, other than a private dwelling house, without notice or demand, and into a private dwelling or room, after demand and refusal to open same, to execute any such warrant.
(55) To restrain all felons and persons guilty of offenses against this State or the United States, and deliver them over to the authorities or court having jurisdiction of the offense whereof such persons are accused.
(56) To apprehend and punish any person who, without a State license therefor, is guilty of carrying about his person, within the Municipality, any revolver or other pistol, dirk, bowie knife, slingshot, razor, billy, metallic or false knuckle, or any other dangerous or deadly weapon of like kind and character, as provided by chapter fifty-one of the Acts of the legislature of one thousand nine hundred and nine, or any amendment thereof, and the punishment therefor, whether for the first or other offenses, shall be that prescribed by said chapter for any such person guilty under the misdemeanor clause provided therein; provided, that the Mayor acting as ex-officio justice of the peace, may, after enforcing this ordinance, hold such offender to answer to an indictment in the Circuit Court of Barbour County for such offense, under the State law.
(57) To regulate the erection, construction, alteration and repair of dwelling houses, buildings and other structures, within the Municipality, to issue permits therefor, and to compel the numbering of such houses and buildings by the owners and occupiers thereof; and to prescribe by ordinance the distance which dwelling houses, and other structures in resident districts shall be set back from the sidewalk.
(58) To regulate the hanging of doors, the construction of stairways and elevators, and require fire escapes in theaters, churches, school buildings, factories and other places deemed necessary by the Council.
(59) To establish fire limits and to regulate the construction of buildings, and designate materials to be used in the construction of buildings within such limits.
(60) To regulate the building of fire walls, fireplaces, chimneys, boilers, smokestacks, stovepipes, and the burning of wastepaper, trash or other waste matter, in the corporate limits.
(61) To regulate the height, construction and inspection of all new buildings hereafter erected, the alteration and repair of all buildings now and hereafter erected, to require permits to be obtained of the Council therefor, and the submission of plans and specifications to the Council for its approval; to regulate the limits within which it shall be lawful to erect any steps, porticos, bay windows, awnings, signs, columns, piers, or other projection of structural ornaments of any kind for the houses or buildings on any street or alley.
(62) To provide for the prevention and extinguishing of fires, and for this purpose, the Council may equip and govern fire companies, prescribe the powers and duties of such companies and departments, and the several officers thereof, and may authorize the organization of volunteer fire companies under such rules and regulations as the Council may prescribe, and impose on those who fail to obey any lawful command of the officer in charge of said fire company or volunteer company, any penalty which the Council is authorized to impose for violation of an ordinance, and to give authority to the chief fire officer to direct the pulling down or destruction of any building, fence, wall or other thing, if such officer deems it necessary to prevent the spreading of any fire which is being extinguished under the direction of such officer, and without any liability on the Municipality for damages therefor, and to regulate the flow of traffic going to the scene of or returning from any fire.
(63) To protect the persons and property within the corporate limits and preserve the peace and good order therein, and for this purpose, to appoint, when necessary, a police force and such other officers as may be deemed necessary; and to provide a lockup, jail or other suitable place to confine persons sentenced to imprisonment for violation of the ordinances of said City; provided, however, that the jail of Barbour County may be used for that purpose, if authorized by the County Court of said County.
(64) To require any person violating any of the ordinances of said City, or any order for which a fine, imprisonment or both is imposed, to work upon the streets of said City in case of nonpayment of said fine, until the same is paid by such labor, or in case imprisonment is imposed, to work upon the streets of said City during the term of such imprisonment in addition to the payment of such fine, under such regulations as the Council may prescribe.
(65) To prescribe the powers, define the duties of the officers appointed under the corporate authority, fix their terms of service and compensation, if not otherwise prescribed by this Charter, and to require and take from them bonds, when deemed necessary, payable to the State of West Virginia or the City of Philippi, with sureties, and in such penalties as may be prescribed, conditioned for the faithful discharge of their respective duties; provided, that the compensation of any officer, elected or appointed, shall not be increased nor diminished during the time for which he is elected or appointed, unless due notice of such intention is first served on the officer interested.
(66) To make regulations with respect to, and have supervision and control over the erection, removal and relocation of all telephone, telegraph, electric light or other poles within said City, and the extension of wires, lines or poles by any individuals or corporations.
(67) To require the extension of any electric light wire, telephone lines, gas line, water system, or other public service within said corporate limits, to meet the needs of the inhabitants, when, in the opinion of the Council, such extension is necessary and justifiable.
(68) To grant and regulate all franchises in, upon, over and under the streets, alleys and public ways of said City, under such restrictions as shall be provided by ordinances and general law; but no exclusive franchise shall be granted by said City Council to any individual or corporation; nor shall any franchise be granted for a longer period than twenty years.
(69) To acquire, erect or authorize or prohibit the erection of gas works, electric light works or waterworks within the City limits; to prevent injury to such works or the pollution of any gas or water used or intended to be used by the public or by individuals; and to do all things necessary to adequately supply said City and the inhabitants thereof with pure, healthful and wholesome water; and to require any company furnishing gas or electricity for sale or distribution in said City, to furnish an adequate supply thereof; to require gas fixtures, electric light wires, telephone wires and all apparatuses used in connection with any of these, to be kept in repair and suitable for use, and free from danger, so far as practicable; to use, generate, distribute, sell and control electricity and gas heat, light and power, and to furnish light for the streets, highways, buildings, stores and other places in an about said City.
(70) To require any gas company or person furnishing gas for said City or the inhabitants thereof, to put in standard meters for the measurement thereof, and may appoint a competent person to inspect the meters and remove the same if not standard and in good order; to prevent injury to any gas works, electric light works, water system or any gas meter or meter within said Municipality.
(71) The Council shall have the right to require of any water company or person furnishing water for the use of the inhabitants of said City, for hire, compensation or regard, to obey any order of the Council with respect to keeping the reservoir or other source from which said water is furnished, free from filth and in a good, clean condition, and may require said water company to put in such lines as may be necessary to pump the said water into the reservoir or other receptacle therefor, without pumping the same into the main distributing lines, or in any other way or manner effecting them; and may fix fines and penalties for any failure on the part of any corporation, company or other person distributing water, to obey and order of the Council or any authorized officer of the Town, respecting the same, or any ordinance that may be enacted by the Council relative thereto.
(72) The Council shall have the right to own, maintain, operate and control any electric light plant within said City, or to provide for, or purchase electric power and to use, generate, distribute, sell and control electricity and gas for heat, light and power, and to furnish light for the streets, houses, buildings, stores and other places in and about said City, and for such electricity other than that furnished for the Municipality in lighting its streets and public places, it may charge reasonable rates, but such rates in all cases shall be uniform; and such electric light plant shall be under the supervision and control of the Council, and its wires, poles, distributing system and machinery shall be kept in such repair so that as little danger as possible shall arise therefrom and so the same will furnish an adequate supply of electricity to all persons in said City desiring to use same.
(73) The Council shall have the right to provide a sewerage system for said City, and may require the owner of any property abutting upon any street or alley in which a sewer had been laid or placed, to connect a sewer leading from his or her property or lot into any public sewer which is located in such street or alley adjoining the same, and if the owner or occupier of said lot or property fails or refuses so to do, after having been given a reasonable notice, the Council may enter upon such lot and construct such sewers, and may levy the actual cost thereof against the lot upon which the same is built and collect such costs from the owner of such lot in the same manner as City or State taxes are collected; in addition thereto, the Council may punish by fine, or fine and imprisonment, any person who permits any drainage from his residence or lot to enter upon any street or upon any property after a sewer has been placed in a street or alley adjacent to his property to which he should connect, after notice has been given to him by the Council to make such connection.
(74) The Council shall have the right to impose fines and penalties for any interference with or destruction of the sewer system or any part thereof in said City, or for the destruction of or damage to any street, alley or sidewalk in said City, or any improper use thereof; it shall have the right to regulate or prevent the use of the sidewalk for bicycles, pushcarts, sleds, tricycles, roller skates and other things of like character, and to fix fines and penalties for violation of the ordinances respecting same.
(75) To grant by ordinance or resolution permits for the temporary use of such parts of its streets, roads, alleys and public places as the Council may deem proper and right to be used in the construction, alteration or repair of buildings located thereon, or for such other purposes as the Council may deem proper and right, and under such regulations and for such time as the Council may prescribe.
(76) The Council may buy, lease and operate either within or without the Municipality, stone quarries, crusher and land for said purposes or for the purpose of furnishing a supply of stone or other matter suitable for macadamizing or paving the streets, sidewalks and alleys, and improving public property.
(77) Whenever in the opinion of the Council it is necessary that any sidewalk be built or repaired, it shall first have a competent engineer fix a grade line for such sidewalk and shall then, by order of Council, name the character of material out of which same is to be built, and fix the width thereof, and put in such curbing as the Council may deem necessary, and shall then give notice, in writing, to the owner or occupier of said lot, if he be found, and if he be not found, posting a notice thereof upon the said lot and at the front door of the Courthouse of Barbour County for at least ten days, requiring the construction of said sidewalk in accordance with the requirements of the Council and upon the grade fixed by the said engineer, and if such sidewalk be not built, altered or repaired within twenty days afer such notice is first given or posted, the Council shall proceed to put in the same under its supervision and control, and shall charge the expense thereof against the property along which the same is being placed, altered or repaired, and shall cause an itemized account of the same to be made up and delivered to such property owner or occupier of such premises, if found, and if he be not found, have the same recorded in the County Clerk’s office of Barbour County, and the same shall constitute a lien upon the same lot or property and shall be collected as other taxes are collected; provided, nothing herein contained shall prevent the Council from requiring immediate repair of such sidewalks now or hereafter constructed that may become dangerous, and after notice to the property owner along which the same run, the Council may make such immediate repairs, if the property owner fails to make some after such notice, and the expense thereof shall be a lien in the manner aforesaid.
(78) The Council shall have the right, when, in its opinion, it is necessary or proper to do so, to pave any street or alley of said City, and to prescribe the material to be used in such paving and to charge one-third of the total costs of preparing and paving the said street, to the adjacent property owners on each side of the said street or alley, and to pay one-third thereof out of such funds as the Council may provide, but such paving shall be done and such assessments and charges made against the property owner as provided by chapter eight of the Acts of the legislature of one thousand nine hundred and eight, and any amendments thereto, and hereafter made.
(79) To operate by ordinance such committees or boards, and delegate such authority thereto as may be deemed necessary or advisable by the Council; and to employ such legal counsel on behalf of the City, from time to time, as the City may deem necessary to protect the interests of the City.
(80) To provide for the annual assessment of the taxable property in said City, including dogs kept in said City, and to provide a revenue for the City for Municipal purposes and appropriate such revenue to its expenses; provided, nothing herein contained shall require the Council to keep in repair and maintain any bridge or bridges within said corporation, now or hereafter owned by the County of Barbour, but the officers of said corporation in the preservation of law and order shall have jurisdiction over any such bridges within such corporation; and provided, further, that the police regulations as may be ordained by said City, and the right and power to enforce the same shall extend one mile into the State of West Virginia beyond the corporate limits of said City.
(81) The Council may, within any prescribed area, prohibit the erection on any street or in any square, of any building, or of any addition to any building more than ten feet high, unless the outer walls thereof be made of brick and mortar or other fireproof material, and may require the removal of any building or addition which shall be hereafter erected contrary to this prohibition, at the expense of the owner or owners thereof.
(82) The Council shall keep all roads, streets and alleys within its limits passable and in good repair, and may provide the expenses therefor by a direct taxation, as provided under this Charter, or in any other manner authorized by law; and the residents of said City who are taxed herein for the purpose of maintaining such streets and alleys shall be exempt from the payment of any County road tax.
(83) In the enforcement of the ordinances, orders, rules, regulations and bylaws of the said City, no fine shall be imposed exceeding five hundred dollars ($500.00), and no person shall be imprisoned or compelled to labor on the streets of said City, as aforesaid, exceeding six. months; provided, that any violation of the prohibition or liquor laws of this State shall be punished by the fines and penalties herein prescribed; and violations of the road law or automobile laws, may be punished by the fines and penalties prescribed by general law, unless different fines and penalties are expressly prescribed by the ordinances of said City, and in all cases where a fine is imposed for an amount exceeding ten dollars or a person be imprisoned or compelled to labor as aforesaid, an appeal may be taken from such decision upon the same terms and conditions that appeals are taken from the judgment of a justice of this state; and in no case shall a fine of less than ten dollars be imposed where the ordinance prescribed a fine, if the defendant requests that such fine be made at least ten dollars for the purpose of appeal.
(84) The Council shall have the right to enforce the attendance of its members at all regular meetings and at all special meetings of which such members have notice, and may cause the arrest and punishment, by fine or fine and imprisonment, of any such member who refuses to attend and take part in its proceedings.
(85) It shall be the express duty of the Council to present charges against any of its members, or any officer of the City, who fails to perform, or who does not promptly and diligently perform any duty prescribed by this Act, or by any ordinance or resolution of the Council, and upon hearing thereof before the Council, after notice to such officer, he shall be removed from office by the Council, if the charges be found correct.
(Amended 11-22-1955)