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Show I STATE ASKS CITY TO PAY BACK THOUSANDS. Utah's state road commission has called on Opden City to reTund approximately ap-proximately $50,000 which, according to the figures of the experts of the commission, was spent without proper authority or justification by (he former for-mer state road commission in aiding Ogden and Weber county build the highway along Washington avenue, from the river bridge to the north' rn I I limits of Ogden. This is a most unusual demand. The State commission docs not claim the i work was not authorized or the claims dttly allowed, but maintains that the state should have participated In the, construction of but one eighteen-foot j aUip of paving through Ogden and should have borne none of the engineering, engi-neering, although the contract entered en-tered into between the city and state, Vrlth the county joining, obligated jeach to carry a percentage of the cost of construction of the work as buMlned In the specifications pre-j pared by the city engineer of Ogden. The reopening of what was consld crcd a closed deal. Is so amazing as to I have caused the City officials to wonder won-der if the state in the end will demand a return of all the money put into the paving of what, at one time, was the ! "worst piece of transcontinental high -way west of the sand dunes of Wom tag The mayor informed the state board J that, unless it could be shown their predecessors were feeble minded, and. therefore had been taken advantage I of. or they outrageously had exceeded the powers conveyed by the leci.-la h tttre. Ogden city would be disposed to D persuade the board to accept the Bel I tiemehts of Up pat I .If the state board in 1918, 1919 and I 1920 did wrong in assisting Ogden to I Construct the highway on North I Washington, then the stat board of I 1916 and 1917 committed a similar of-fj of-fj fen'se in helping to build the paving on J Sonth Washington f However, the -nn.r- ;.ud luims Ij came under the careful scrutiny of the j 6tate board, including the auditor. I -(sere duly passed upon, allowed and I paid, and the action should be accept- I ed as final. |