MERIDIAN TOWNSHIP - The Managing Director of the Ingham County Road Department Bill Conklin delivered a presentation on March 25th to residents and elected officials in Meridian Township on the road funding ballot proposal.

Conklin said currently more than half of the roads in the Ingham County are in poor condition. Due to lack of funding and increasing cost of maintenance material, such as chip sealing oil, road salt and diesel fuel, the road department doesn't have enough workforce and resources to preserve the roads as they used to do.

With the proposed additional funding, the Road Department would restore a lot of roads.

"We believe when the funding is fully developed, we would be able to do additional 16 miles of road rehabilitation and an additional 30 miles of road preservation," said Conklin.

According to the presentation, the new road funding package includes increasing sales tax from 6 to 7 percent. That means people would pay one more percent on general goods and services beginning in October 2015 if the proposal passed. It also suggests replacing the gas and motor fuel tax with wholesale fuel tax because part of the current tax revenue doesn't go to roads.

The new fuel tax system will help the transportation department pay off debt in two years and thus saves the state interest payment.

The additional revenue will also be used to add road preservation and rehabilitation, as well as replace old equipment.

The road funding proposal will be voted on in the May 5th election. Conklin will be giving another presentation at the Meridian Township Board meeting on April. 7th. Anyone interested is welcome to attend.