The commissioner is hereby authorized and required to accept, without interest or penalty, returns of information and payments of taxes for the first year in which this act is operative within the times specifically limited therefor, or at any time within thirty days after the effective date of this act, whichever date is later. In the first year for which this act is operative, valuations made by the commissioner for that year under chapters nineteen through twenty-nine, inclusive, of Title 54 of the Revised Statutes shall constitute the basis of property assessments under this act. Nothing in this section shall be construed to relieve any taxpayer of any requirement of payment or collection of taxes other than by temporary extension of time necessitated by the enactment hereof, after the respective dates for action required hereunder; provided, however, that, for the purpose of adjusting the taxes levied for the year one thousand nine hundred and forty-one in accordance with the provisions of this amendatory act, the commissioner is hereby directed to recompute and relevy, in accordance with the provisions of this amendatory act, the franchise tax for the year one thousand nine hundred and forty-one against each railroad system, or railroad not part of a system.

Said recomputation and relevy of the franchise tax shall be made by the commissioner within fifteen days after the effective date of this amendatory act, and within five days thereafter he shall (1) serve upon each taxpayer a statement of the total amount of franchise tax payable under said recomputation and relevy, setting forth the manner of computation thereof; and (2) report and certify all such recomputed and relevied assessments and the statements thereof to the State Comptroller. The several statements of the franchise tax so recomputed and relevied shall be recorded in books kept in the office of the State Comptroller to be provided by him for that purpose and shall be public records open to public inspection; and such record of such recomputed and relevied franchise taxes shall constitute the final assessment of franchise taxes payable by each taxpayer for the year one thousand nine hundred and forty-one.

The State Treasurer and State Comptroller are directed to credit against the amount of franchise tax for the year one thousand nine hundred and forty-one so recomputed and relevied by the State Tax Commissioner, the full amount of franchise tax which may have been heretofore paid by any railroad system or railroad not part of a system pursuant to the provisions of the act of which this act is amendatory or of any act amendatory thereof or supplemental thereto, and if the amount of any such franchise tax so heretofore paid shall exceed the amount of the franchise tax so recomputed and relevied by the commissioner pursuant to the provisions of this amendatory act, the excess shall be credited upon the tax next legally levied against and payable by such railroad system or railroad not part of a system.

One-half the receipts from the franchise tax for one thousand nine hundred and forty-one as recomputed and relevied hereunder shall be by the State Comptroller allotted to and paid over to the taxing districts in the proportion prescribed in section twenty-four-a of the act hereby amended; and the Comptroller shall transmit to each county treasurer a certificate showing the amounts so allotted to the taxing districts therein, and shall, on or before the tenth day following the date upon which said franchise taxes so recomputed and relevied for one thousand nine hundred and forty-one are payable, draw and transmit his warrant upon the State treasury in favor of the several county treasurers, for the amounts so allotted to their several counties. Each county treasurer shall forthwith pay to the collector or other proper officer of each taxing district the amount so allotted thereto. The amount thus paid to the county and taxing district shall be at the disposal of the proper authorities for public purposes.

Nothing in this amendatory act, or in the act hereby amended, shall be construed to deprive any interested party of the right of review of said relevied franchise taxes in the manner now provided by law.

L.1941, c. 291, p. 796, s. 73. Amended by L.1942, c. 169, p. 516, s. 4.