Natchez aldermen seek banks to finance park improvements

NATCHEZ, Miss. –The Board of Aldermen on Tuesday reaffirmed its plans to get $2 million for improving Natchez parks and streets by borrowing the money through a bond issue.

Aldermen approved the resolution needed to publicly ask banks and investment firms wanting to finance the project to make their bids by July 30. This will ensure the money from the bond issue will be in the city treasury by the middle of August.

While the city will have to repay bond investors over several years the $2 million with added interest, Mayor Dan Gibson has said the city can handle the additional debt and won’t need to increase taxes for this. He’s estimated it’ll add about $120,000 a year to the city’s debt load.

The list of park projects includes spending $500,000 for restoring the deteriorating Duncan Park Golf Course clubhouse and $365,000 for the dilapidated North Natchez Youth Center. New tennis courts, playground equipment and splash pads are also among the recreational offerings in the works.

The board on Tuesday also approved the hiring of architects to design renovations of the Duncan Park golf clubhouse and the North Natchez Youth Center.

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Gibson and aldermen honored former mayor Butch Brown with an official proclamation and a key to the city for his 12 years leading Natchez. “He knew how to get things done,” Alderman Sarah Carter Smith said of Brown, 78, who’s been ill since suffering a stroke while serving as mayor 2012-2016. He previously served two terms 1992-2000.

“He left his mark on Natchez, and he’s left his mark on me,” said Gibson, who recited a list of Brown’s accomplishments and noted he’s sought his advice since he became mayor in July 2020.

While Brown aggressively asserted himself as the city’s chief administrator, his love for Natchez was obvious, said Alderman Dan Dillard. “Even if you disagreed with him, you had to love him,” he said.

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The board voted to give an extra $9,000 to help refurbish the Watkins Street Cemetery, the old private burial ground for black Natchez residents. It includes the countless number killed in the 1940 Rhythm Club fire interred in mass graves. The north Natchez cemetery has trees damaged from recent storms and is suffering water-drainage and erosion problems.

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Natchez Police Chief Joseph Daughtry noted how well the crowd behaved for Hank Williams Jr.’s July 4 concert, which the chief said drew more than 6,200 people to downtown Natchez. He said only two arrests were made – for public drunkenness – no car burglaries were reported and traffic flowed smoothly.

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The mayor broke a 3-3 tie vote to ask a judge to close down a convenience store by Cathedral School that he says is a drug-dealing magnet. Gibson said the store on Martin Luther King and Aldrich streets is a “public nuisance.” Local law-enforcement officers recently busted drug dealers there.