82a-307. Cleaning and maintaining banks and channels by county; petition; claims for damages. Upon petition of fifty (50) taxpayers of any county of this state, owning land in the flood plain of any river in such county, the board of county commissioners of each county in this state are hereby authorized within their respective jurisdictions to clean and maintain the banks and channels of the streams and watercourses within definitely established bank lines, as provided in K.S.A. 82a-307a, and to keep said streams free of drift, trees and other obstructions, for the purpose of reducing floods and overflows; and for the purposes aforesaid the said board of county commissioners may enter upon private property, if necessary, to clean and maintain such streams, doing as little damage as possible thereto, and when material damage shall be done to any property, said commissioners shall allow reasonable compensation therefor, when claimed by the owner thereof, if said claim is presented in writing to said board within ten (10) days from the date of the removal of said obstruction; and that nothing in this act shall be construed to permit the board of county commissioners of any county to remove or destroy any permanent improvement, including dams and bridges, in and over such streams, providing such improvements, dams or bridges have been lawfully placed thereon.

History: L. 1929, ch. 143, § 2; L. 1931, ch. 318, § 1; L. 1951, ch. 527, § 1; June 30.