1. To maintain and preserve the levees or other improvements made pursuant to sections 245.010 to 245.280 and to strengthen, repair, replace and restore the same, when needed, and for the purpose of defraying the current expenses of the district, the board of supervisors, on or before the first day of September in each year thereafter, may levy an assessment upon each tract or parcel of land and upon corporate property within the district, to be known as a “maintenance tax”. The maintenance tax shall be apportioned upon the basis of the net assessment of benefits accruing for original construction, and shall be certified to the collector of revenue of each county in which lands of the district are situate in the same book in like manner and at the same time as the annual tax is certified, but in a separate column, under the heading “maintenance tax”. The collector shall demand and collect the maintenance tax and make return thereof and shall receive the same compensation therefor and be liable for the same penalties for failure or neglect so to do as is provided herein for the annual installment tax.

2. No maintenance tax shall be levied or assessed against any lands or other property which is not protected from overflow by the levees and other improvements of the district. No such tax heretofore levied or assessed against any such lands or other property shall be collected by or for the district, and the board of supervisors of the district is hereby authorized and empowered to strike from the levee tax books of the district any unpaid maintenance tax which has been levied or assessed against any such lands or other property.