§1596.6. Special assessments; installment notes; effect of default; assessment lien

A. Upon receipt of the certified statement or report of the engineer as provided in R.S. 38:1596.5, the governing authority shall review the statement or report, including the proposed local or special assessments, and shall make a determination as to whether each lot or parcel of real estate to be assessed will be benefited to an amount not less than the proposed local or special assessment. Proposed assessments that are found by the governing authority to have been erroneously assessed or for which the governing authority does not find said benefit shall be deleted from the certified statement or report. The deletion of such proposed assessments from the certified statement or report for either of these reasons shall in no way invalidate or affect the legality of the contract awarded for the construction of the proposed improvements, nor shall such deletions constitute a violation of the public contract law of this state.

B. Following the review and finding as to benefit by the governing authority, there shall be mailed to each property owner to be assessed a notice advising each such owner of his proposed assessment and the manner and time for payment thereof. The notice shall set forth a general description of the proposed improvements, such description of the property to be assessed and the location thereof as the governing authority may deem necessary, and shall notify the property owner to advise the governing authority in writing within fifteen days from the date of such notice if inaccuracies exist in the proposed assessment. Notice shall be given by depositing written notice in the United States mail, postage paid, and addressed to the property owner at his address as it appeared on the last approved tax roll on which the property was assessed for taxes by the governing authority. The certificate of the clerk or secretary of the governing authority that such notice has been given in writing to all property owners to be assessed shall establish a conclusive legal presumption that all requirements of notice as set forth hereinabove have been legally satisfied.

C. After thirty days have elapsed from the date of the mailing of the notice of proposed assessments, the governing authority shall adopt an ordinance levying a local or special assessment on each lot or parcel of real estate in the area involved in the proportion that its area bears to the total area to be assessed or in the proportion that its front footage bears to the total front footage to be assessed, as shall be determined by the governing authority, and the total of all such local or special assessments shall represent the total cost of the work contemplated. When the construction is financed partly under the provisions hereof and partly by the issuance of bonds or by any other method, then the total of all assessments levied hereunder shall represent the total cost of the work contemplated, including all items mentioned above, less the amount provided by bonds or such other method.

D.(1) The amount assessed in the ordinance shall be due and collectible immediately on its passage and if not paid within thirty days from the date of the adoption of said ordinance it will be conclusively presumed that any property owner whose property is affected thereby exercises the right and option, which is hereby authorized, to pay the amount due in equal annual installments bearing interest at a rate to be established by the governing authority of the district, including all the items above set forth, and extending over a period not exceeding fifteen years, all within the discretion of the governing authority, and as provided for in the ordinance levying such local or special assessments. The first installment shall become due on December 31 of the then current year or one year after the date of the assessment ordinance herein provided for, in the discretion of the governing authority of the district, and annually thereafter.

(2) The failure to pay any installment or interest thereon when due shall ipso facto cause all other installments and the interest thereon to become due and payable, and the drainage district, within thirty days from date of such default, shall proceed against the property for the collection of the total amount due thereon, including interest, plus twenty percent additional on the principal and interest of the past due installment or installments or twenty percent of the amount sued for and, in the event judgment is necessary to effect collection, twenty percent of the amount of the judgment rendered as attorney's fees. However, attorney's fees shall be payable by the property owner only if the governing authority has made demand on the property owner through registered or certified mail and he has failed to pay the amount due within ten days after such demand.

E.(1) A certified copy of the ordinance levying the local or special assessments shall be filed with the clerk of court of Ouachita Parish, who shall record the same in the mortgage records of the parish, and when so filed and recorded, the ordinance shall operate as a lien and privilege against all real estate therein assessed. This lien and privilege shall prime all other liens and privileges except taxes and prior recorded local or special assessment levied for streets, sewerage, or water.

(2) The payments made in cash shall be expended for no purpose other than the payment of the cost of the improvements.

(3) Any errors in descriptions or amounts in any assessment ordinance adopted pursuant to this Section may be corrected by the adoption of an amendatory ordinance which shall set forth only the corrected descriptions or amounts and which shall be recorded in the same manner as the original ordinance levying the assessments. The adoption of any such corrective ordinance shall serve only to postpone the thirty-day period for cash payment in full of the assessment actually affected and corrected by such amendatory ordinance, and the due dates of the installments of such assessments so corrected which are not paid in full in cash within thirty days from the date of adoption of the amendatory ordinance shall be the same as the due dates of the installments of the assessments levied in the original ordinance and not affected or corrected by any such amendatory ordinance or ordinances.

Acts 1985, No. 979, §1.