Chap. 158.—An ACT to amend and re-enact section 2 of an act entitled an act
to provide for the construction, reconstruction, improvement and maintenance
of the public roads and bridges of Giles county, other than such as are included
in the State highway system, and to provide for the issuing of county bonds
for the construction, reconstruction and permanent improvement of the roads
and bridges embraced in the county highway system, approved February 10
1920. [H B 296}

Approved March 14, 1924.

1. Be it enacted by the general assembly of Virginia, That section
two of an act entitled an act to provide for the construction, recon-
struction, improvement and maintenance of the public roads and bridges
of Giles county, other than such as are included in the State highway
system, and to provide for the issuing of county bonds for the construc-
tion, reconstruction and permanent improvement of the roads and
bridges embraced in the county highway system, approved February
tenth, nineteen hundred and twenty, be amended and re-enacted so as
to read as follows:
Section 2. That the construction, improvement and maintenance
of the public roads and bridges in the several magisterial districts in
said county, not embraced in either the State or county highway sys-
tems, and which shall be termed “district roads,’’ shall be under the
control, management and supervision of the district boards, the board
for each district to be composed of the supervisor and road commissioner
for the district, and the county road superintendent, the superintendent
to be a member of the board for each district; and the supervisor for
each district shall be the chairman of the board of his district, and said
district road boards shall have original jurisdiction on the questions of
establishing, altering or changing the public roads of their respective
districts, other than those roads known as State highways.

Any person who shall desire the establishment of any such public
road or any change in any existing public road shall file in the clerk’s
office a petition in writing setting forth the location of such proposed
new road, or such proposed change, which petition shall state with
reasonable certainty the reasons for such new road or change and the
name or names of persons whose land or lands will probably be affected
thereby. Whereupon the clerk will issue summons directing the local
road board of the magisterial district in which a greater part of the
road, or change, will be located, to go upon said location on a day fixed
in said summons; together with a notice to the landowners who will be
affected by said motion, notifying them of the day so fixed in the sum-
mons above mentioned, which said summons and notices shall be
executed by the sheriff of Giles county and returned to the clerk’s
office. The said local road board so summoned shall go upon the land,
and, if in their judgment, it should be done, shall establish such new
road, or make such changes in the location of old roads, as, in the judg-
ment of a majority of said local road board, shall be proper, and shall
fix and allow such damages as, in the judgment of said majority, shall
compensate any landowner affected by said new location or change,
such damages to be paid out of the county levy for county road pur-

The said board shall at once file their report in the clerk’s office
showing the proposed new road, or change in location of old road, whose
lands are affected, a map or diagram of same, the amount of damages
claimed by the landowners, the amount of damage allowed by said
board and any other reasons, in their judgment, they may think proper
for their actions. From the action of said district road board, as shown
by their report, any person who feels himself aggrieved or affected by
said report, or the attorney for the Commonwealth of Giles county,
acting for the county of Giles, may appeal from the action of said board
within ten days after the filing of their report in the clerk’s office, by
filing notice of such appeal to the circuit court of Giles county, which
court shall hear and try the appeal, as other appeals are heard, and may
empanel a jury, if required by either party, and render such judgment as
in its opinion may be proper, which judgment shall be final.

The clerk shall keep a book for the purpose of recording the reports
of said local road boards and index the same, for which services, as well
as his services in issuing the summons and notices and other services
rendered in pursuance of this act, he shall be paid such fees as are pro-
vided by law for similar services in other matters, and the sheriff shall
ye paid for his services in a similar way, such fees to be paid out of the
county road levy.

It shall be the duty of the attorney for the Commonwealth of Giles
sounty to render such services to the said local road board as they may
Pquest of him and to represent the county in the appeals mentioned in

is act.

2. An emergency existing, this act shall be in force from its passage.