Hattiesburg, Mississippi – On Monday, the City of Hattiesburg will pave its 100th mile of roadway under the Barker Administration. The one-hundredth mile will take place in the Mobile-Bouie neighborhood.

“Addressing paving needs in our city has been a priority for both our administration and the City Council. Together, we quickly established an annual spend of $2.5 million – $2.8 million on paving in each year’s fiscal budget,” said Mayor Toby Barker. “Paired with large grants and the use tax to cover large stretches of roadway, we were able to prioritize paving improvements across every ward.”

Under that banner, significant stretches of roadway improvements included major travel thoroughfares, including Richburg Road, WSF Tatum, Hardy Street, Highway 42 Bypass, North 38th Avenue, Old Airport Road and Cross Creek Parkway.

Roadways paved each year came from staff recommendations, community feedback and requests by City Council members.

Paving one hundred miles is a significant milestone, but Barker believes future projects will come from a more comprehensive maintenance program.

“This approach means we’ll take care of water, sewer and drainage elements on a street before we lay new asphalt. The more strategic we can be with our infrastructure, the longer the initial paving investment can serve the needs of our residents,” said Barker. “Above all, as we continue our trajectory toward being a premier city in the Gulf South, we will try to live out our stated objective of every neighborhood seeing continual progress.”

Financially, the City commits to continue its fiscal discipline in budgeting for the general fund, pursuing large grants/legislative allocations and leveraging use tax revenue which diverts a portion of the tax collected for internet and out-of-state sales back to local governments for infrastructure improvements.

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