Mississippi § 51-13-107 - Creation of district.

§ 51-13-107. Creation of district.

Within twenty (20) days after the passage of this article, the Mississippi Commission on Environmental Quality, State Board of Health, Mississippi Commission on Wildlife, Fisheries and Parks, and the Forestry Commission of the State of Mississippi shall appoint their respective members to the proposed district board of directors as provided in Section 51-13-105. The four (4) appointive members, upon taking the oath as provided, shall meet in the Office of the Mississippi Department of Environmental Quality in Jackson, Mississippi, within ten (10) days and adopt by a majority vote a resolution setting forth their intentions of creating the district and shall forthwith send a certified copy of said resolution to: (1) each member of the Tombigbee Valley Authority as now constituted, (2) the Governor, (3) executive officers of the Mississippi Commission on Environmental Quality, Board of Health, Mississippi Commission on Wildlife, Fisheries and Parks, and Forestry Commission, and (4) the president of the board of supervisors and chancery clerk of each county through which any part of the Tombigbee River or any of its tributaries lie. The four (4) state agencies herein named and the Tombigbee Valley Authority may, within ten (10) days from receipt of said resolution, adopt its own resolution favorable or unfavorable to the creation of said district; and the respective boards of supervisors may at their next regular meeting likewise adopt a resolution favorable or unfavorable to creating said district. All of said resolutions adopted shall be certified by its secretary, clerk, or executive officer and shall be filed with each state agency, political subdivision, or other agency named in Section 55-13-105. Every board of supervisors of those counties desiring to become members of the district, through which the Tombigbee River or any of its tributaries lie, shall, upon receipt of the certified resolutions mentioned in this section, declare said board’s intentions by adopting a resolution expressing its desire to have said district created and to levy an ad valorem tax not to exceed one-half (1/2) mill on all the taxable property within the Tombigbee Watershed area of said county for the use and benefit of the Tombigbee River Valley Water Management District. The said resolution shall be published once each week for three (3) consecutive weeks in some newspaper published in the county and having a general circulation therein, and if no petition signed by twenty percent (20%) of the qualified electors of the county is filed with the board requesting the calling of an election on the question of the county’s participation in the district and the levying of the one-half (1/2) mill tax levy aforesaid, the board may proceed to have the county become a member of said district and to levy the one-half (1/2) mill tax levy but if, within twenty-one (21) days after the date of the first publication of said resolution, a petition signed by at least twenty percent (20%) of the qualified electors of said county, requesting an election on the proposition of said county becoming a member of the proposed district and the levying of the one-half (1/2) mill tax as herein provided, is filed, said election shall be held and conducted as now provided by law for such elections. If such an election is held and a majority of those voting therein vote for the proposition, the board shall, by appropriate resolution, bring the county into the district and levy the one-half (1/2) mill tax as otherwise provided by law. If the majority of those voting in such election shall vote against the proposition, then the county shall not become a member of the district nor levy the one-half (1/2) mill tax; and no further election shall be so conducted until the lapse of two (2) years after the last election. Whenever an aggregate of six (6) counties have become members of the Tombigbee River Valley Water Management District in the manner provided in this section, the said district shall be created as an agency of the state and a body politic and corporate with all of the powers granted it by statute.