The fate of a half-mill, two year property tax levy to fund county road maintenance performed by the county Road Commission will be in the hands of county voters after the county Board of Commissioners approved ballot language last week.

The .5-mill, two year request will raise an estimated $998,300.80 in 2008 for Road Commission’s coffers if approved by county voters at the August 5 Primary Election.

The property tax request has received overwhelming support from voters in the past. In August 2006 voters approved the request by a 1,449 vote margin; 3,035 yes to 1,586 no.

The commission’s 2008 budget estimates $6,062,500 in total revenues — including the property tax revenues.

If approved in August the property tax would be collected from tax bills sent out in December of 2008 and 2009. A review of voting data over the past 25 years show county voters have approved the request since it was first made in 1986, a fact to which commission chairman Lee A. Bowen points with pride. At the commission’s last meeting held March 18, Bowen said he considers the millage renewal vote as report card for how the commission is doing.

“If the people like what we are doing they vote for the millage,” he said.

The Leelanau County Road Commission, like other road commissions around the state, faces continual reductions in revenues from state and federal sources, yet ever increasing costs for labor, supplies and material.

In April the commission will seek bids for stone and other materials for maintaining county roads. It will also seek bids for a fuel provider.

For the last two years at least the commission has contracted with Busby Oil & Propane of Northport to provide regular gasoline and diesel fuel for its trucks. Clerk Joe Nedow said he expects higher retail prices paid at the pump to be reflected in bids sought for commodity purchases made by the Road Commission.

When the half-mill property tax was first approved by voters in 1986, its purpose was to provide extra road maintenance during the winter months. Member Glen M. Noonan, now serving his 38th year on the Road Commission, said the property tax allowed the commission to provide evening and weekend snow plowing. “If we didn’t have the millage, we couldn’t offer that service,” he said at the meeting last week.

Any millage funds left over from winter road maintenance needs is channeled toward county road maintenance projects. A portion of those funds also go to the three incorporated villages in the county — Suttons Bay, Northport and Empire — because they also receive state and federal gas and weight tax revenues, The property tax is levied on all tax-eligible properties in the county.