(a) If, within ninety (90) days after the publication of the ordinance creating and establishing the district, persons claiming to be a majority in value of the owners of real property within the district shall present to the city council a petition that the plants and systems be acquired and consolidated, that the improvements be made, that thereafter the plants and systems be maintained, and that the cost thereof be assessed and charged upon the real property situated within the district, the city clerk shall give notice by publication one (1) time a week for two (2) weeks in a newspaper published in the county in which the city lies. This publication shall advise the property owners within the district that on a day therein named the council will hear the petition and determine whether those signing the petition constitute a majority in value of the owners of real property.
(b) At the meeting named in the notice, the owners of real property within the district shall be heard before the council, which shall determine whether the signers of the petition constitute a majority in value. The findings of the council shall be conclusive unless within thirty (30) days thereafter suit is brought to review its action in the chancery court of the county where the city lies.
(c) In ascertaining whether the petition purporting to be signed by a majority in value of the owners of real property in the district is actually so signed, council and courts shall take and be governed by the valuation placed upon the property as shown by the last county assessment on file in the county clerk's office.
(d) The petition provided for in this section may be in the following form:
“We, the undersigned, being a majority in value of the owners of real property in consolidated Water and Light District of the city of , hereby petition your honorable body that said consolidated district proceed to acquire the existing water plant and systems heretofore constructed or acquired by Water Improvement District No of said city, and also to acquire the existing Light Plant and System heretofore constructed or acquired by Light Improvement District No of said City, and that said consolidated district proceed from time to time to enlarge, improve, extend, repair and maintain said consolidated plants and systems, and that the cost thereof be assessed and charged upon the real property within said consolidated district. We expressly consent that whenever the limits of the city of are extended that any part of the new territory embraced in said new limits may be annexed to this consolidated district upon the petition of a majority in value of the owners of real property in the territory proposed to be annexed to this district.”
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