Improvements authorized; estimate; construction; bonds; election

The board of directors may cause any or all natural watercourses within the district to be widened and deepened, walls, embankments and levees to be constructed along the banks, and obstructions and sand bars to be removed from the channel thereof, or such other improvements, including detention dams and reservoirs in areas adjacent to such watercourses, to be made thereto as may be deemed necessary to prevent the overflow of such watercourses or protect property from damage thereby. Before any such work shall be contracted for, plans and specifications for such work and an estimate of the cost thereof shall be made under oath by a competent engineer appointed for the purpose and embodied in a written report and filed with the secretary. If, upon consideration of such report and such other information as the board of directors may obtain, it shall be determined by the board of directors that the improvement of any natural watercourse by the removal of obstructions from the channel thereof or otherwise or the construction of any levee, levees, system of levees or detention dams and reservoirs will prevent the overflow of such natural watercourse, and thereby protect all of the lands within the drainage district from injury therefrom, and will be conducive to the public health, convenience or welfare, the board of directors shall have power to cause such levee, levees or such detention dams and reservoirs to be constructed and such other improvement and work to be done, and to issue bonds not exceeding in amount 20% on the taxable property of the district as shown by the assessment and tax rolls of the next preceding year to pay the cost thereof, such bonds to be paid by a general tax to be levied upon all of the taxable property within the drainage district issuing the same, except that: (1) Such improvement shall not be made until it has been authorized by a vote of the taxpayers of the district, at a special election to be called and held for that purpose at such time and place and in such manner as the board of directors may prescribe by an order entered upon its journal; and (2) the board of directors of the drainage district shall have no power to remove, lower or injure any dam constructed by any city in this state in or across any nonnavigable natural watercourse for the purpose of holding or storing water for the use of the city and its inhabitants, or to make any excavation or ditch to permit the flow of water around or by said dam, without first filing an application with the division of water resources of the Kansas department of agriculture pursuant to K.S.A. 82a-301, and amendments thereto.