Public hearing before setting property assessments

(a) The council shall by advertisement and mailing in the same manner as that provided in § 14-10.4 , give notice of the total amount of the cost of the improvements based upon the bid of the lowest responsive, responsible, and reliable bidder, the method or basis and the rate of assessment proposed to be charged to the benefitted district or subdistricts or zones, if any, and a statement that the assessment map, assessment roll and description of properties are available for examination at the office of the director during business hours at any time before and including the date fixed for hearing. The notice shall also fix a date and place for a public hearing at which the council will sit as a board of equalization to receive complaints or objections respecting the total amounts of the proposed several assessments. Except as provided herein, the hearing shall be held at the same council meeting at which the assessment bill is first placed on the council agenda for passage on second reading, and shall be held before passage of the bill on second reading. Notwithstanding any other law to the contrary, the council may give notice and hold the assessment hearing before advertising for bids on any sanitary sewer system improvements in which the total assessment is based on a rate fixed by § 14-8.2 . If, in a city-initiated improvement district, 100 percent of the owners and lessees of the frontage to be assessed upon any public highway, or 100 percent of the area of land to be assessed, file a duly acknowledged consent to the amount and apportionment of the proposed assessments, it shall be unnecessary to give the notice or hold the public hearing required by this subsection. (b) After the hearing required by subsection (a), the council may amend the assessments as may seem equitable or just, or shall confirm the first proposed assessments. Upon reaching a final decision, the council shall, by ordinance, fix the portions of the cost to be assessed against the benefited properties and against the owners thereof respectively, which ordinance shall incorporate by reference the assessment roll as approved by the council. After the effective date of such ordinance, the amounts of the several assessments so listed, advertised and incorporated and not previously objected to shall be conclusively presumed to be just and equitable and not in excess of the special benefits accruing or to accrue by reason of the improvement to the specific property assessed. )