county surveyor with instructions to examine said road and make a report in writing on the same. The surveyor shall include in his report his opinion as to whether the road should be vacated, whether the same is in use or has been in use, whether it will be advisable to preserve the same for a general road system in the future, whether the public will be benefited by the vacation, and all other facts, matters and things which will be of importance to the board of county commissioners, and also file his cost bill. [L. '01, § 2, p. 190.]

30. Hearing on Report.

The board when in session shall fix a date for hearing the said report and shall cause notice of said hearing to be published in the county official newspaper and posted in a conspicuous place on said road, at least twenty days before the date set for hearing as follows: If the road be one mile or less than one mile long, there shall be one notice posted near each end of said road; if said road be more than one mile long there shall be one notice posted near each end and one notice on each mile of said road. [L. '01, § 3, p. 190.]

31. Order.

On the day set for hearing of said report the commissioners shall consider the same, together with the petition, and any objection that may be made to vacating the road, and if the road may be useful as a part of the general road system it shall not be vacated, but if the public will be benefited by the vacation then the commissioners may vacate the road or any portion thereof, and not otherwise; if the commissioners shall determine to vacate the road, or any part thereof, they shall, on payment of all costs by the principal petitioner, declare the road vacated and make a record of the same. [L. ’01, § 4, p. 191.]

32. Costs.

The clerk of the board of county commissioners shall make a statement in writing of all costs and expenses incurred in the proceedings and file the same with the county treasurer who shall proceed to collect the same. [L. '01, § 5, p. 191.]

No public road or highway or part thereof shall be vacated or cease to be a public highway until so ordered by the proper board of county commissioners, or by operation of law, or judgment of a court of competent jurisdiction. (L. '01, § 6, p. 191.)

34. Effect of Plat.

The approval of any plat by the board of county commissioners or mayor and common council of any municipality shall not vacate any street, public road, or highway covered by such plat or over which such plat is laid. [L. '01, § 7, p. 191.]

35. Viewers.

If a person appointed by the county commissioners as a viewer, reviewer or surveyor of any road, refuse or neglect to perform the duties required by this act, without making satisfactory excuse for such refusal or neglect, he shall be fined in any sum not exceeding fifteen dollars, to be recovered by action by any person suing for the same before a justice of the peace within the district wherein the person so appointed and refusing or neglecting may reside; and the recovery shall be paid without delay by the justice of the peace or constable collecting the same to the treasurer of the county, taking his receipt therefor; and the county commissioners shall cause all fines which shall be paid into the county treasury under the provisions of this title to be expended on roads and bridges within the county. [L. '90, § 27, p. 601.]

36. Alteration of Road.

When a county road is injured or destroyed by the washing of any lake, river or creek, or by any washing or sliding of land occasioned by natural drainage, the supervisor of the road district in which such injury or loss of road has occurred, upon petition of any six freeholders of the district, shall call to their aid a competent surveyor, and proceed to examine such road; and if, upon such examination, the commissioners, or a majority of them, are satisfied that such road has been destroyed or so much injured that the public good requires an alteration of the same, they shall

proceed to alter and lay out so much of the new road as may supply the several parts of the road thus destroyed or injured. [L. '90, § 29, p. 602.]

37. Damages by Alteration.

If a person through whose lands any such alteration of the new road is laid out feels injured thereby, he shall make application to the overseer of his road district, at the time of making the alteration on his premises, to assess and determine, according to the provisions of section twenty-nine [36] of this act, the compensation to be made in money for the property sought to be appropriated, and how much less valuable, if any, the premises will be rendered by the alteration of the road; thereafter the road overseer shall make report to the county commissioners, who shall appoint three reviewers to inspect, assess and report the amount of damages sustained in the premises, and the clerk and commissioners of the proper county shall be governed in the reception and recording of such report in all respects as is prescribed in this act in cases of new roads. [L. '90, § 30, p. 602.]

38. Roads Unopened.

Any county road, or part thereof, which has heretofore been or may hereafter be authorized, which remains unopened for public use for the space of five years after the order is made or authority granted for opening the same, shall be and the same is hereby vacated, and the authority for building the same barred by lapse of time. (L. '90, § 32, p. 603.)

39. Roads on Section Lines.

When notice has been given and a road has been petitioned for as hereinbefore provided, and the petition calls for a road wholly on section lines, and where there are no damages claimed, and evidence filed that the route is practicable, the county commissioners may grant the road without reviewing or surveying the same. [L. '90, § 33, p. 603.]

40. Monuments.

The county commissioners shall cause monuments of stone to be placed at the beginning and terminus of all roads established under this act. [L. '90, § 34, p. 603.]

41. Order to Open Road, When to Be Executed.

No order of the county commissioners for the establishment of a county road, or for the alteration or vacation, in whole or in part, of a state or county road, or changing the width of a county road, shall be executed until twenty days have elpased after the entry of such order in the record of the commissioners, and no order shall issue to open any county road until fifteen days after the same has been established, at which time the clerk of the board may issue such order by direction of the commissioners, unless an appeal has been perfected. [L. '90, § 35, p. 603.]

42. Certain Roads Declared Highways.

All public roads and highways in this state that have been used as such for a period of not less than seven years, and are now so used, where the same have been worked and kept up at the expense of the public, are hereby declared to be lawful roads and highways within the meaning and intent of the laws now existing governing public roads and highways in this state. [L. '90, § 1, p. 733.]

43. Defects in Laying Out Shall Not Defeat.

No informalities in the records in laying out, altering, establishing or vacating any public road or highway such as contemplated in section one [42] of this act now existing on file in the offices of the various county auditors of this state shall be construed to invalidate or vacate such public roads or highways. [L. '90, § 2, p. 733.]

44. Re-Survey of Roads.

Where by reason of the loss or destruction of the field notes of the original survey, or in case of defective survey or record, or in case of such numerous alterations of any county road since the original location and survey, that its location cannot be accurately defined by the papers on file in the proper county auditor's office, or where, through some omission or defect, doubts may exist as to the legal establishment or evidence of establishment of any county road, or highway, the board of county commissioners of the proper

county may, if they deem it necessary, order such highway, or any part of a county road used and traveled by the public, to be resurveyed, platted and recorded as hereinafter provided. [L. '81, § 1, p. 11.]

45. Recording Original Survey.

A copy of the field notes, together with a plat of any highway or county road surveyed under the provisions of the preceding section, shall be filed in the office of the county auditor, and thereupon he shall designate a day at a regular term of the board of county commissioners not less than twenty days from the publication of said notice, upon which said board will, unless good cause be shown against so doing, approve of such survey and plat, and order them to be recorded as in cases of original establishment of a county road. [L. '81, § 2, p. 11.]

46. Notice of Reopening of Road.

At least twenty days before the day fixed by the auditor, as above provided, a notice in which shall be inserted the name of each resident owner or occupier of said land lying on the portion of road sought to be legalized, or abutting on the line of survey, shall be published four successive weeks in some newspaper published in the county, if any such there be, or by posting the same in five public. places in the vicinity of said survey, which notice may be in the following form: "C. D, resident on that portion of the county road used and traveled as such for years, commencing at —, in county, running thence, (name distance and in general terms points of location), and terminating at —, has been resurveyed, and the board of county commissioners will, at their next term, hear and determine whether the road herein described and included in said survey, shall be ordered as a lawful county road and public highway, and objections thereto, or claims for damages, must be filed in the auditor's office on or before the first day of the term, A. D. 18—, or the road herein above described will be declared a county road and public highway." A B, County Auditor.

[L. '81, § 3, p. 11.]