TYLER, Texas — The City of Tyler's Seal Coat Program is designed to help elongate the life of its streets.
A consultant evaluated the city's roads in 2016, ranking the streets a 77 out of a possible 100, which is considered "fairly good."
Mayor Martin Heines said Wednesday during the city council meeting, he wanted to prepare Tyler's roads for the next 10 years.
“When I came to this council we were putting maybe $300,000 (a year) into streets,” Heines said. “When we did that, we were not keeping up with the quality of our streets."
The current property tax rate is 24.4452 cents for $100 of property value. The proposed increase is 25.99 cents.
"The property tax that is proposed to be increased, really focuses on seal coating," city engineer Lisa Crossman said.
Two cents of the potential rate would be dedicated toward the Seal Coat Program.
"We're getting generally around $750,000 a year to do this seal coat process," Crossman said. "This increase to two cents is going to give the city about $1.5 million a year."
The Seal Coat Program, adds a protective layer on top of existing roads, which Crossman says "extends the life."
Last year, the city worked on almost 28 miles of road. According to the city's proposed budget, about 79 miles could be upgraded.
"It could be anywhere within the city," Crossman explained "This seal coat is mostly used in residential neighborhoods, as opposed to some of the more major streets."
There will be a budget presentation and public hearing Sept. 11 at the city council meeting, members will vote on the budget and property tax increase Sept. 25 and it will go into effect Oct. 1.