Landowners’ meetings; election of board of supervisors; duties of Department of Environmental Protection.

(1) Within 20 days after the effective date of a special act creating a district, notice of a landowners’ meeting shall be given as provided in the special act. The notice shall be published once a week for 2 consecutive weeks in a newspaper of general circulation in each county in which lands of the district are located, the last publication to be not less than 10 nor more than 15 days before the date of the meeting. The meeting of the owners of the lands located in the district shall be scheduled, at a day and hour specified, at some public place in the county within which most of the district lands are located, for the purpose of electing a board of three supervisors, to be composed of owners of the lands in the district and residents of the county or counties in which the district is located.

(2) The landowners, when assembled, shall organize by the election of a chair and secretary of the meeting, who shall conduct the election. At the election, each and every acre of assessable land in the district shall represent one share, and each owner shall be entitled to one vote in person or by proxy in writing duly signed, for every acre of assessable land owned by him or her in the district, and the three persons receiving the highest number of votes shall be declared elected as supervisors. The appointment of proxies shall comply with s. 607.0722. Landowners owning less than 1 assessable acre in the aggregate shall be entitled to one vote. Landowners with more than 1 assessable acre are entitled to one additional vote for any fraction of an acre greater than 1/2 acre, when all of the landowners’ acreage has been aggregated for purposes of voting. The landowners shall at such election determine the length of the terms of office of each supervisor so elected by them, which shall be respectively 1, 2, and 3 years, and they shall serve until their successors shall have been elected and qualified.

(3) The Department of Environmental Protection, at any such meeting, may represent the state, and shall have the right to vote for supervisors, or upon any matter that may come properly before said meeting to the extent of the acreage owned by the state in such district, provided such acreage is subject to assessment by the water control district, which vote may be cast by any person designated by said department. Guardians may represent their wards, executors and administrators may represent estates of deceased persons, and private corporations may be represented by their officers or duly authorized agents. The owners and proxy holders of district acreage who are present at a duly noticed landowners’ meeting shall constitute a quorum for the purpose of holding such election or any election thereafter.

(4) Any elected or appointed supervisor may be removed by the Governor for malfeasance, misfeasance, dishonesty, incompetency, or failure to perform the duties imposed upon him or her by this chapter, and any vacancies which may occur in any such office so filled by appointment shall be filled by the Governor as soon as practicable.