Illinois § 11-126-4

§ 11-126-4.

The corporate authorities of each municipality may make and enforce all needful rules and regulations in the construction and management of such a system of waterworks, and for the use of the water supplied thereby. The corporate authorities of each municipality also may make and enforce all needful rules, regulations, and enact ordinances for the improvement, care, and protection from pollution or other injury of any impounding reservoir or artificial lake constructed or maintained by the municipality for water supply purposes and any adjacent zone of land which the municipality may acquire or control. If the leasing of portions of such adjacent zone of land will, in the discretion of the corporate authorities, aid in the protection from pollution or other injury of the impounding reservoir or artificial lake by promoting forestation, development or care of other suitable vegetation, and the improvement, care and maintenance of the premises, the corporate authorities may lease those portions of that land jointly or severally to custodians of good reputation and character for periods not to exceed 60 years, and permit those custodians to construct, maintain, use, and occupy dwelling houses and other structures thereon for such rental and on such other terms and conditions and subject to such rules and regulations and with such powers and duties as may be determined by the corporate authorities. The corporate authorities of each municipality have the power to fix and collect from the inhabitants thereof the rent or rates for the use and benefit of water used or supplied to them by such a system of waterworks, as the corporate authorities shall deem just and expedient. These rents or rates shall be paid and collected in such manner as the corporate authorities by ordinance shall provide. Such charges, rents, or rates are liens upon the real estate upon or for which water service is supplied whenever the charges, rents, or rates become delinquent as provided by the ordinance of the municipality fixing a delinquency date. However, the municipality has no preference over the rights of any purchaser, mortgagee, judgment creditor, or other lien holder arising prior to the filing of the notice of such a lien in the office of the recorder of the county in which such real estate is located, or in the office of the registrar of titles of such county if the property affected is registered under "An Act concerning land titles", approved May 1, 1897, as amended. This notice shall consist of a sworn statement setting out (1) a description of such real estate sufficient for the identification thereof, (2) the amount of money due for such water service, and (3) the date when such amount became delinquent. The municipality may foreclose this lien in the same manner and with the same effect as in the foreclosure of mortgages on real estate. (Source: P.A. 97-813, eff. 7-13-12.)