1600 LAWS OF MARYLAND. [CH. 703

buildings within that portion of the Maryland Washington
Metropolitan District, established by the General Assembly
of Maryland of 1927, lying within Montgomery County,
as they may deem necessary, to regulate and establish
the size of bricks and thickness of walls that are to be
used in the houses to be built in said district or any
portion therefor; to provide for the entry into and examina-
tion of all buildings, lots, yards, enclosures and ear, boats
and vehicles of every description in said districts to ascertain
their condition for health, cleanliness and safety; to provide
for the taking down and removal of buildings, walls, struc-
tures or superstructures in said district that are or may be-
come dangerous, or to require owners to move them to put
them in a safe and sound condition at their own expense;
to regulate the building and maintenance of party walls,
partitions, fences, parapet and fire walls, smoke flues, fire-
places, hot-air flues, boilers, kettles, smokestacks and stove-
pipes in said district, and the storage of gasoline and other
combustibles or explosives therein; to provide for and regu-
late the safe construction, inspection and repair oi all
private and public buildings within said district; to regu-
late, restrain or prohibit the erection of wooden or frame
buildings within the present limits of said district or
any thickly populated portion of the same and to remove the
same at the owner's expense, when erected or suffered to
remain contrary to law or such regulations as they may
adopt; to regulate the height, construction and inspection of
all new buildings hereafter erected in said district; to regu-
late the limits within which it shall be lawful to erect steps,
porticoes, bay windows, or other structural ornaments to
houses fronting on any of the highways, streets, avenues,
lanes or alleys of said district, and generally to adopt and
enforce for the whole of said district or for thickly populated
portions thereof, all necessary regulations or rules for the
aforegoing purposes, and to prescribe fines and penalties for
violations thereof; provided, however, that no such rules and
regulations so adopted by said County Commissioners as
aforesaid shall be deemed valid or effective until the same
shall have been formally adopted by the said County Com-
missioners at a regular meeting, and recorded in a book kept
in their office for the purpose, and until said rules and regu-
lations shall have been published at least three times in two
of the county papers in Montgomery County; and it shall
be the duty of the County Commissioners to cause said rules