§ 231. Permanent financing of district and special improvements. 1.
When the cost of any improvement is to be borne by special assessment to
be assessed and paid as provided in this subdivision, such improvement
shall be temporarily financed pursuant to the local finance law until
after the confirmation of the assessment. When such assessments shall
have been confirmed, a period of thirty days shall be given from the
date of confirmation in which such assessments may be paid in whole or
in part, provided a part payment so made shall equal ten per centum, or
a multiple thereof, of the amount payable and the obligation or
appropriate portion thereof cancelled. Upon the expiration of such
period, obligations shall be issued pursuant to the local finance law
for the total cost thereof, deducting the amounts of the assessments or
parts thereof so paid within such period.

Upon ascertainment of the amount of the cost to be assessed by special
assessment the town board shall prescribe that such assessments may be
so paid at the option of the payer in whole or in part, without penalty
or interest, and the unpaid amounts, if any, to be paid in annual
installments, with interest thereon.

If bond anticipation notes are issued, all collections from
assessments so paid in whole or in part shall be applied at once in
reduction of such notes.

Annual collections of assessments payable in installments shall be
applied in payment of maturing obligations and accruing interest. If the
total amount of assessments payable in installments collected in any
year shall be less than the amount required to pay maturing bonds and
accruing interest, the town board may direct that surplus moneys, not
otherwise appropriated, be applied.

Any surplus accruing from the sale of obligations, whether from
premiums or otherwise, shall be applied to the reduction of the debt so
incurred.

2. Notwithstanding any other provisions of this chapter, the town
board, upon the completion of the improvement or at any time prior
thereto, may determine to issue, pursuant to the local finance law, the
obligations of said town in such an amount as said board may estimate to
be sufficient to pay the entire cost of the improvement, but not in
excess of the maximum amount proposed to be expended for the improvement
as stated in the petition, or in the final order, if the town board
proceeded under article twelve-A of this chapter, or, if such
improvement be an improvement constructed pursuant to section two
hundred two-b of this chapter, not in excess of the estimated expense
thereof as stated in the notice of hearing. There shall be annually
apportioned and assessed upon the several lots and parcels of land
especially benefited by the improvement in proportion to the amount of
benefit which the improvement shall confer upon the same, and in the
manner provided in section two hundred two-a of the town law for the
assessment of the cost of maintenance in a sewer district, an amount
sufficient to pay the principal and interest of any obligations issued
for such improvement as the same shall become due and to pay the cost of
maintenance for the fiscal year commencing on the first day of January
next succeeding. In the event that the annual collection of such
assessments shall be less than the amount required to pay the principal
and interest of such obligations as they shall become due, the town
board shall direct that surplus moneys not otherwise appropriated be
applied.

Whenever an unpaid assessment has been divided into annual
installments pursuant to this section the town board may, at the time of
making such division, or at any time thereafter, provide that all future
annual installments may be prepaid together with a sum sufficient to
meet all future pro rata shares of the annual interest payable on such
obligations and which would otherwise have been added to such future
installments had same not been prepaid. All sums received from such
prepayments shall be deposited and retained in a separate account in a
depositary designated in the manner provided by section ten of the
general municipal law to be applied only to the payment of the
obligations issued pursuant to this section. Notwithstanding the
foregoing, such sums so received may be invested in the manner permitted
in section eleven of the general municipal law.