When such a contract shall have been entered into there shall be designated at the first legal joint meeting, or adjournment thereof, held in each calendar year a special commissioner to serve as such until the first joint meeting held in the ensuing year. If such designation shall not be made at any such first annual meeting, the United States engineer in charge of the district in which such improvement is located shall be such special commissioner until the next succeeding first annual meeting. If a special commissioner shall for any reason fail to serve as such officer, or be removed by unanimous vote of any legal meeting, a successor to him or her may be chosen at any subsequent legal joint meeting during his or her term. Such special commissioner shall have power to attend and vote at any joint meeting in the following cases and none other, to wit: (1) In cases specially so provided in RCW 86.13.050 hereof; (2) in any case where the vote of any such joint meeting shall stand equally divided upon any question arising under this chapter or such contract or in the prosecution of the work of improvement. The special commissioner shall have no voice or vote except upon questions on which the vote of the county commissioners is equally divided. The procedure in cases covered by the foregoing subdivision (2) of this section shall be substantially as follows: It shall be the duty of the secretary of the meeting at which the division shall occur, if the attendance of the special commissioner at that meeting is not secured, to forthwith transmit to the special commissioner written notice of the fact of disagreement and the question involved, and of the time and place to which the meeting shall have been adjourned or at which the question will recur. If there shall be no such adjournment of the meeting, or if the secretary shall not give such notice, any two commissioners may in the manner provided in RCW 86.13.050 call a joint meeting for the consideration of the question in dispute, and in such event either county auditor may give such notice to the special commissioner. No informality in the mode of securing the attendance of the special commissioner shall invalidate the proceedings of or any vote taken at any meeting which he or she shall attend and which he or she is empowered to attend by the provisions of this chapter. The special commissioner shall receive, to be paid equally out of the two funds, his or her traveling and other expenses incurred in attending meetings or otherwise in connection with the work of improvement, and such compensation for his or her services as shall be fixed by the joint meeting which shall have selected him or her, or failing to be so fixed, his or her compensation shall be ten dollars per day of actual service.