(a) If an agency has complied with the notice, protest, and hearing requirements of Section 53753, or if an agency is not required to comply with those requirements because the assessment is exempt from the procedures and approval process set forth in Section 4 of Article XIII D of the California Constitution, then those requirements shall not apply in subsequent fiscal years unless the assessment methodology is changed to increase the assessment, or the amount of that assessment is proposed to exceed an assessment formula or range of assessments adopted by an agency in accordance with Article XIII D of the California Constitution or Section 53753.

(b) Notwithstanding subdivision (a), the following assessments existing on the effective date of Article XIII D of the California Constitution shall be exempt from the procedures and approval process set forth in Section 4 of that article:

(1) Any assessment imposed exclusively to finance the capital costs or maintenance and operation expenses for sidewalks, streets, sewers, water, flood control, drainage systems, or vector control.

(2) Any assessment imposed pursuant to a petition signed by the persons owning all of the parcels subject to the assessment at the time the assessment is initially imposed.

(3) Any assessment the proceeds of which are exclusively used to repay bonded indebtedness of which the failure to pay would violate the Contract Impairment Clause of the Constitution of the United States.

(4) Any assessment that previously received majority voter approval from the voters voting in an election on the issue of the assessment.

Any subsequent increases in an assessment listed in paragraph (1), (2), or (4) shall be subject to the procedures and approval process set forth in Section 4 of Article XIII D of the California Constitution.

(c) For purposes of this section, the following words and phrases shall have the following meanings:

(1) “Assessments existing on the effective date of Article XIII D of the California Constitution” means assessments levied by the legislative body of the agency on or before November 6, 1996.

(2) “Procedures and approval process set forth in Section 4 of Article XIII D” means all of the requirements set forth in Section 4 of Article XIII D of the California Constitution, including, but not limited to, the requirement to separate general and special benefits and the requirement to assess parcels that are owned or used by an agency, the State of California, or the United States of America.

(Added by Stats. 1997, Ch. 38, Sec. 5. Effective July 1, 1997.)