Official outlines petition-ditch process, says property owners pay assessed share

An elected county official identified as Patrick briefed the Lawrence County Board of Commissioners on the petition-ditch process under state law during the Sept. 9 meeting, describing the legal and financial steps that lead to county-funded ditch construction and repairs.

"There is such a thing called the petition ditch," Patrick told the board, referencing the state law provision that enables landowners or the county to create or repair open drainage ditches that benefit multiple properties. "It's a process that you have to go through hearings, viewings. There's bonds that's done with it. There's plans. There's estimates. There's all that type of stuff," he said, adding that costs are apportioned to those who benefit from the ditch and collected through property tax assessment.

Commissioners asked whether a covered or altered ditch in Burlington could be uncovered and who would be responsible for the costs. Patrick said the petition-ditch process can be used to uncover or reconstruct ditches but that responsibility for paying to uncover or reconstruct depends on whether the ditch is on highway right-of-way (which the county maintains) or on private property where benefitting landowners would bear costs.

Patrick described typical ditch projects as involving easements and large trapezoidal sections in agricultural areas; he said Lawrence County's topography means many drainage issues are concentrated in river-bottom areas and that some petition-ditch scenarios common elsewhere in the state are rare locally.

The commissioners asked staff to follow up and schedule further discussion on specific drainage requests raised at the meeting.