Tonganoxie ? A new petition has been filed to try to give voters a say in whether the city of Tonganoxie should appropriate money toward improving a section of Leavenworth County Road 1 east of town.

The Leavenworth County Clerk’s office will determine whether there are enough signatures of registered voters on the petition for it to be valid. A similar petition turned in a month ago was dismissed for lack of proper signatures.

The new petition, prepared by Tonganoxie residents Roger and Phyllis Shilling, has 359 signatures on it. At least 262 of them have to be registered voters. A determination will be made next week, County Clerk Linda Scheer said.

The petition asks the city of Tonganoxie to either adopt an ordinance banning the city from contributing money to the county road project or put it up for a citywide election. The Shillings went door-to-door seeking signatures and were helped by about six other people, Phyllis Shilling said.

“We did not express our opinion; we just told them this was an opportunity for them to express their opinion,” Phyllis Shilling said.

The improvements to County Road 1 would be in conjunction with the Kansas Turnpike Authority building a new Interstate 70 interchange that would connect to the road. The road upgrade is estimated to cost $14 million, and funds have been committed by KTA and Leavenworth County.

Tonganoxie City Council voted earlier this year to appropriate $2.8 million for the project, but as part of the arrangement, it wants to know how the city will benefit from the road upgrade.

“We have not been told how we are going to benefit from our $2.8 million,” Shilling said.

It is too late for the road question to be on the Nov. 7 general election ballot. But the city is considering a special election in December about whether to collect a half-cent sales tax to fund a new public swimming pool. If valid, the road question might be on that ballot.