The new Mississippi Lottery could start selling tickets sometime during the final half of this year.

That’s according to Gerard Gibert, who is one of five board members of the Mississippi Lottery Corporation.

Gibert tells The Associated Press on Monday that the board in recent weeks has hired the Balch & Bingham law firm, which has offices in Mississippi and other states.

He says the board will soon start the process of choosing banking services and hiring a president to run the day-to-day business of the corporation.

Mississippi lawmakers voted last year to create a lottery to generate money for transportation.

Gibert says the Mississippi Lottery will have to apply to become part of multistate games that offer big-dollar prizes, including Powerball.