Section 70 ILCS 605/1-2 - DefinitionsWhen used in this Act unless the context requires otherwise:
(a) "Clerk", when used without qualifying words, means the clerk of the circuit court acting, ex officio, as clerk of a district.(b) "Court" means the circuit court of the county in which a district was organized.(c) "Ditch" means an artificially constructed open drain or a natural drain which has been artificially improved.(d) "Drain" includes ditch and means any water course or conduit, whether open, covered or enclosed, natural or artificial, or partly natural and partly artificial, by which waters coming or falling upon lands are carried away.(e) "Drainage district" is synonymous with "district" and includes all types of drainage districts organized under this or any prior Act.(f) "Drainage structures" means those structures other than drains, levees and pumping plants which are intended to promote or aid drainage. Such structures may be independent from other drainage work or may be a part of or incidental to such work. The term includes, but is not restricted to, catchbasins, bulkheads, spillways, flumes, drop-boxes, pipe outlets, junction boxes and structures the primary purpose of which is to prevent the erosion of soil into a district drain.(g) "Drainage system" means the system by which lands are drained or protected from overflow or both and includes drains, drainage structures, levees and pumping plants.(h) "Land" means real property and includes, but is not restricted to, lots, railroad rights-of-way and easements.(i) "Landowner" or "owner" means the owner of real property and includes an owner of an undivided interest, a life tenant, a remainderman, a public or private corporation, a trustee under an active trust and the holder of the beneficial interest under a land trust, but does not include a mortgagee, a trustee under a trust deed in the nature of a mortgage, a lien holder or a lessee.(j) "Adult landowner" or "adult owner" includes public and private corporations.(k) "Municipal corporation exercising drainage powers" means a sanitary district, city, village or other public body empowered by law to exercise and which is exercising drainage functions.(m) "Non-resident" means a person residing outside the county or counties in which the district or any portion thereof is situated.(n) "Registered Professional Engineer" means a professional engineer registered under the provisions of the Professional Engineering Practice Act of 1989.(o) "Sanitary purposes" includes, but is not restricted to, the protection of residential, commercial and industrial property from inundation and overflow.(p) Words importing the masculine gender include the feminine.(q) Words importing the singular number include the plural and words importing the plural include the singular.(r) "Farm Drainage Act" means and refers to "An Act to provide for drainage for agricultural and sanitary purposes, and to repeal certain acts therein named", approved June 27, 1885, as amended, which Act is repealed by this Act.(s) "Levee Act" means and refers to "An Act to provide for the construction, reparation and protection of drains, ditches and levees across the lands of others, for agricultural, sanitary and mining purposes, and to provide for the organization of drainage districts", approved May 29, 1879, as amended, which Act is repealed by this Act. P.A. 91-357, eff. 7/29/1999.