Lauderdale County supervisors are taking stock of the available resources as they look to start off another board term.

Mississippi’s Office of State Aid Road Construction provides counties with several pots of state funding for infrastructure projects, with funds being allocated at the beginning of each four-year term. This board term began on January 1 and will run through Dec. 31, 2027.

Available funding is divided up into State Aid funds, which can be spent on road and bridge projects on roads that have been designated state aid routes, Local System Bridge Project, or LSBP, funds, which are earmarked for the smaller, local bridges along county roads, and State Aid Bridge Project, or SABP, funds. The SABP program is a recent addition, and this will be the first time counties are allocated funding under the new program. SABP funds can be spent on bridge projects that are along designated state aid routes.

Road Manager Rush Mayatt said the SABP program is specifically aimed at State Aid bridges with the intention of freeing up some of the regular State Aid funds to be spent on road projects.

In a work session Thursday, Richmond Alexander of Engineering Plus, which serves as the county engineer, said Lauderdale County is set to receive proximally $5 million in State Aid funding, $3.1 million in LSBP funding and $2.1 million in SABP funding.

“For this board term, you’re just short of $11 million,” he said. “Rush and I plan to spend every dime of it.”

Mayatt said the county’s pot of money is roughly $2 million more than the previous term.

Although $11 million may seem like a large sum, Lauderdale County already has numerous projects in the works to use up parts of those funds.

A closed bridge on Sandflat Road and two bridges still open but needing attention on Old Eighth Street and Vally Road are set to be paid for with State Aid funds, Alexander said. Sandflat, he said, will likely go to bid this summer.

The county also has three bridges on Richard Johnson Road, Snowden Road and Old Highway 39 already in the works using LSBP funding, Alexander said. All three bridges are currently closed, and projects to replace them are in the design phase, he said.

After some delay acquiring the needed rights-of-way, a bridge project on Murphy Road is also moving forward and should go out for bid soon, Alexander said. The Murphy Road bridge, which is just north of the Pine Ridge landfill, has been closed since October 2022.

Currently underway is a project replacing two bridges on Lizelia Road with box culverts, Alexander said, with the bottom, both aprons and one wall of the culvert poured at the first site. Once the remaining portions of the culvert are poured, he said, the contractor will move to the second site to begin work there.

Alexander said the contractor had set a goal of beginning at the second site by the end of the month, but that may be unrealistic under the current weather forecast.

The Lizelia Road project is being paid for with part of the county’s American Rescue Plan Act funds. A second bridge project on Zero Road is also planned with ARPA dollars.

Progress is also being made on a bridge project along Pine Springs Road, with the county opening bids for the project on Friday, Alexander said. The Pine Springs project has been delayed as the county worked with utility providers to relocate power lines running through the job site. The lines could not be moved during the summer months due to the high power demands from residents’ air conditioners.

The Pine Springs Road project is being funded through the state’s Emergency Road and Bridge Repair fund. Alexander said Thursday he has heard further rounds of ERBR awards may be coming, and he will be watching the state legislature, which is currently in session, to see what funds are appropriated for the program. If another round of projects are funded, he said, Zero Road would be a good one for Lauderdale County to submit.