When they go to the polls in March to chose a new mayor, Mandeville residents will also be asked to renew a half-cent sales tax that funds the city’s annual streets program.

The tax was originally approved by voters in 1991 and was renewed in 2001. If not approved, it will expire on July 1, 2011.

Finance Director Milton Stiebing said he recommended placing the item on the March 27 ballot rather than waiting for closer to July 2011 because the city is already having the mayoral primary on that day and therefore it would not have to pay for another election. It also gives the city time to place the tax renewals back on the ballot in six months if it fails the first go around. The money brought in from this tax can be used for streets, roadside drainage, bridges, sidewalks and bicycle paths.

Stiebing said this year the tax brought in $2.5 million.

The tax is used to pay for the city’s annual streets program, which rotates through the streets in the city.

Stiebing said the dedicated streets tax has always been a half-cent, and there was talk last month of making it a permanent tax. However, he said, Interim Mayor Edward “Bubby” Lyons did not think that was the best approach and suggested asking the voters to approve it only for another 10 years at this time and to consider making it permanent when it comes back up for a vote in 10 years.

Mandeville currently collects the maximum sales tax allowed by law, 2 and a half cents.

One cent of that is a permanent tax that goes toward the city’s general obligation budget, and the other one-cent tax was passed by voters in the late 1980s to pay off bonds the city had taken out to make sewer improvements. It will come up for renewal in 2019 and it can be used for water, sewer, drainage and streets.