The board of directors, to whom a petition for change of boundaries is presented, may require as a condition precedent to the granting of the same, that the petitioners shall severally pay to such district such respective sums, as nearly as the same can be determined by the said directors, as such petitioners or their predecessors in title would have been required to pay to such district as assessments, had such lands been included in such districts at the time the same was originally formed, exclusive of assessments for water previously supplied to original water users in the original district.
K.S.A. 42-728