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Marion residents in ninth through 12th grades will have an opportunity to learn about local government and get involved in their community after Mayor Larry Gill on Tuesday announced plans for a Mayor’s Youth Council.

The council, which will be made up of 20 Marion teens, will attend Board of Aldermen meetings, participate in volunteer projects and community events and more.

“We will have elected officers as part of the council,” Gill said. “They will get to experience how government is handled and get to deal with problems and do some problem solving activities and things like that and just be involved in the community.”

Students will serve one-year terms on the council, Gill said, with seniors rolling off and new council members joining each year to fill the empty positions.

After aldermen approved the idea Tuesday, Gill wasted no time opening the program up for applications. Residents interested in joining the council have until the end of the month to complete their application and return it to town hall.

“We’re going to let it run through Oct. 31,” he said. “The whole month of October, student can apply and hopefully we get good participation and hopefully we can train the next group of leaders.”

For more information about the Mayor’s Youth Council, call Marion Town Hall at 601-483-9573 or visit them online at marionms.org.

Paving Projects

In other business, Marion aldermen are preparing to open bids for paving projects throughout the town. In Tuesday’s meeting, Town Engineer Shaun Miles said bids would be opened on Oct. 18 at 10 a.m., and aldermen have scheduled a special called meeting for 9 a.m. Oct. 19 to review the bids and possibly award the work.

Both the bid opening and the special called meeting are open to the public.

In bidding out the work, town officials set paving Clinton Drive as the main project with alternates to add Koosa Drive and Panola Drive as well as other roads. Using bid alternates to include or exclude additional roads is intended to ensure the town can maximize the amount of paving it can do with the available funds.

The town has about $250,000 in internet use tax funds that it needs to spend by the end of the year.