Author: Imported Author 1890002

NATCHEZ, Miss. – The city has received a state historic preservation grant for an architectural assessment of the Natchez City Cemetery’s century-old Shelter House and maintenance barn.

The Shelter House – the cemetery’s main building – was constructed in 1914. It was designed by Natchez-born architect Samuel Marx, who went on to become a nationally acclaimed designer of homes, commercial buildings and furniture. 

The Craftsman-style Shelter House is a state-designated Mississippi Landmark. The cemetery’s maintenance barn – also designated a Mississippi Landmark – was built around 1920, according to a Mississippi Department of Archives & History report.

 The $5,200 grant from MDAH will help pay for evaluating the two buildings’ conditions and needed structural improvements, said Carter Burns, executive director of the Historic Natchez Foundation and a MDAH board member. The Natchez Cemetery Association is matching the state grant with another $5,200. 

Marx was born 1885 in Natchez and died 1964 in Chicago. The long list of structures he designed include the New Orleans Museum of Art built in 1911, the remodeled Beverly Hills home of actor Edward G. Robinson with an art gallery in the 1940s and the old May Co. department store in Los Angeles in 1939, which is now the Academy Museum of Motion Pictures, according to various published accounts about Marx’s life and work.

Marx was also a prolific collector of art by Picasso, Matisse and others. His collection of paintings and sculptures were donated to the  the Art Institute of Chicago, The Metropolitan Museum of Art (New York), The Museum of Modern Art (New York) and the St. Louis Art Museum.

NATCHEZ, Miss. – A special election July 15 has been set for Natchez voters to select a Municipal Court judge.

Christina Ferrell Daugherty resigned from the city judgeship in April to become an assistant district attorney. Terrence Hunter is serving in the interim. He was appointed by aldermen last month to hold court until voters pick someone to fulfill the judicial term’s remaining three years.

Daugherty resigned as city judge less than a year after she was elected in June 2024 without opposition. She was previously appointed to the post by aldermen and took office in January 2024 to replace Lisa Jordan Dale, who also resigned the city judgeship to become an assistant district attorney in the 6th Circuit Court District, where Daugherty is working now.

The Board of Aldermen on Tuesday set the July 15 special election as recommended by City Clerk Megan McKenzie. Candidates wanting to run for Municipal Court judge file documents to qualify with McKenzie’s office. 

The municipal court’s jurisdiction includes minor criminal offenses, such as shoplifting and disorderly conduct, and unkempt properties deemed by the city as public nuisances.

NATCHEZ, Miss. – Magnolia Bluffs Casino owes Natchez about $535,000 as part of the deal it has leasing city-owned property it occupies along the Mississippi River.

While Mayor Dan Gibson expressed confidence Tuesday the money will be paid soon, city officials will not reaffirm the lease until then.

The money due is for the 2024 and 2025 installments the casino is contracted to pay annually into a community development fund created when Magnolia Bluffs opened in 2012. This has provided money in the past for recreation-related projects, such as renovations of the North Natchez Youth Center and the Duncan Park Golf Clubhouse.

The community development funds are in addition to the $1 million Magnolia Bluffs pays the city annually for leasing property it occupies by the Mississippi River at the end of Roth Hill Road.

The gambling facility is owned by New York-based Saratoga Casino Holdings, which bought Magnolia Bluffs in 2022 from its previous owners.

Magnolia Bluffs Casino employs nearly 160 people and has 490 slot machines, 10 table games and sports-wagering features, according to statistics filed with the Mississippi Gaming Commission that regulates casinos. Magnolia Bluffs’ workforce has declined in recent years. It had 280 employees in 2017. 

In addition, Magnolia Bluffs employs about 30 people at its nearby 140-room hotel on Canal Street.

NATCHEZ, Miss. — The Board of Aldermen voted today to sue the street contractor that city officials blame for doing a shoddy job repaving Canal and Homochitto streets.

The decision was made after months of “back and forth with the contractor” quibbling over what corrective measures must be taken without the city having to pay for the work, said Natchez Mayor Dan Gibson.

“Because of this legal impasse, we have no choice but to commence litigation against Theobald Construction,” Gibson said while meeting with the Board of Aldermen.

The Vicksburg-based contractor late last year put inferior asphalt on the much-traveled Canal and Homochitto streets but refuses to pay for redoing the pavement work, according to allegations recited by the mayor.

Asphalt laid a few months ago that’s already crumbling is among various deficiencies. “It’s quite a laundry list,” Gibson said of the resurfacing flaws.

“Everything that was done incorrectly has to be redone. … We will not rest until it’s done correctly and done right,” he said.

The $1 million street paving project began in November but was halted in December when it was discovered that inferior asphalt was being applied.

“The contractor has refused to correct the unacceptable work. For these reasons and others, the mayor and board are instructing our legal team to begin the process of enforcing the City’s rights against the contractor,” Gibson said in a statement he issued after today’s meeting.

The mayor in April said an agreement had been made with Theobald Construction Services on what corrective measures to do and be finished by early May. However, the contractor insists the city must pay for the work that includes removing the inferior asphalt and spreading out new pavement.

NATCHEZ, Miss. – Adams County supervisors meeting Monday did not formally discuss the ongoing legal dispute with the county’s garbage collector, but board President Kevin Wilson expressed hope the judge overseeing the case will quickly decide the contract can be nullified because of the company’s poor services.

However, Wilson said he fears the case will be a protracted fight that’ll take much time to resolve in Adams County Circuit Court.

In a 2-1 vote in March, county supervisors decided to sue United Infrastructure Services of Louisiana amid complaints about poor service and it being inadequately insured, registered and licensed to do business in Mississippi. The vote was taken after supervisors closed the public out of their meeting and without board members Angela Hutchins and Ricky Gray being present. 

Attending the March 3 Board of Supervisors meeting were members Kevin Wilson and Wes Middelton –  outspoken critics of UIS – and Warren Gaines, who’s been allied with Gray and Hutchins in wanting to retain the New Orleans-based garbage collector.

The subsequent lawsuit filed in March on behalf of the board in Adams County Circuit Court alleges United Infrastructure Services has breached the contract with the county because of poor services that includes missed trash pickups and substandard garbage trucks that frequently break down.

While Wilson expressed hope a new garbage collector can be hired soon to provide better service, that will likely be stalled as UIS fights attempts to nullify its contract with Adams County.   

 The Board of Supervisors hired UIS in 2023 to serve the 5,700 or so households outside Natchez with twice-a-week garbage pickups. That $2 million-a-year contract with UIS was followed by a $20-a-month garbage tax increase on county residents, raising the monthly rate to $35, or $420 a year – $240 more than what county residents were paying prior to 2023. 

Meeting last November with the Board of Supervisors, UIS CEO Jimmie Woods said “we’re (not) perfect, … (but) we have steadily increased our efficiency.” He pointed to various improvements, such as bringing three new trucks to Adams County. With that, he said, “the calls (of complaints) have gone down substantially.”

UIS employees, he said, strive to “bend over backwards to try to accommodate” Adams County households. 

Woods’ parents are from Adams County’s Sibley area and moved to New Orleans in the 1950s, where the Woods’ family business grew to construction, trash collection and real estate development – considered among the South’s leading Black-owned businesses. The company did go bankrupt in 2022 but was reorganized into what UIS is today.

NATCHEZ, Miss. – Adams County supervisors Monday appointed members to the Airport Commission, which has been reconstituted to just be an advisory board without the governing authority it previously had.

The county Board of Supervisors last month decided to strip the five-member commission’s powers over the county-owned airport. Supervisors will now govern the facility with Airport Director Richard Nelson’s day-to-day management and new county Administrator Mitzi Conn’s supervision.

Conn, who was hired by the board in April as county administrator, is a former Airport Commission member. 

Supervisors reappointed previous Airport Commission members Cane Callon and Dante Weir and tapped Noble Guedon as a new member. No decisions were made on who’s to fill the advisory commission’s two other seats. Each of the five county supervisors has a commission member to nominate.

The Board of Supervisors’ decision in April to revoke the Adams County Airport Commission’s previous powers was partly prompted by its members’ lack of aviation experience, said county board President Kevin Wilson. While Adams County supervisors have been appointing the commission since it was established decades ago, they’ve been critical in recent years of members’ actions regarding the airport.

The supervisors in 2021 did discuss disbanding the commission and governing the airport themselves. They expressed concerns then that the commission was running off Nelson, who was appointed in 2018 as the Natchez-Adams County Airport’s director of aviation. 

Converting the commission into an advisory board with no governing powers comes as Natchez-Adams County leaders continue trying to reestablish commercial air service here.

After about 30 years without, city and county officials since 2021 have been aggressively trying without success to lure a passenger airline to serve the community on a regular basis. State and federal grants have been provided to subsidize airline services and improve airport infrastructure.

Located about 10 miles northeast of Natchez, the airport dates back to 1946 when the property was obtained from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers with runways built to military specifications, according to the airport’s historical accounts. The existing terminal building was constructed in 1959 by Natchez and Adams County when the airport had commercial passenger planes serving the area.

NATCHEZ, Miss. – City aldermen have appointed Scott Slover to be defense attorney for people being prosecuted in Natchez Municipal Court but can’t afford to pay a lawyer.

Slover is also the attorney for the Adams County Board of Supervisors. Alderman Billie Joe Frazier questioned whether it’s a conflict of interest for Slover to also be Natchez Municipal Court’s public defender, but the Mississippi Ethics Commission and state Attorney General’s Office said it’s not, according to city board attorney Jack Lazarus.

Aldermen voted 3-2 Tuesday to appoint Slover city public defender.

Frazier – who said attorney Lydia Roberta Blackmon should be considered for the job – was joined by Alderman Felicia Bridgewater-Irving in voting against Slover’s appointment. Backing Slover were Aldermen Valencia Hall, Sarah Carter Smith and Curtis Moroney. Alderman Ben Davis was absent.

Municipal Court’s public defender was Eileen Maher, but she recently resigned and was temporarily replaced by attorney Terrence Hunter. He was appointed city judge by the board earlier this month to replace Christina Daugherty, who’s resigning at the end of this month to become an assistant district attorney.

Natchez Municipal Court’s jurisdiction includes minor criminal offenses, such as shoplifting and disorderly conduct, and unkempt properties deemed by the city as public nuisances. 

NATCHEZ, Miss. — The stalled repaving of Canal and Homochitto streets is expected to begin next week and be finished by mid-May, according to reports provided at Tuesday’s Natchez Board of Aldermen meeting.

Theobald Construction Services – the Vicksburg-based contractor – began the $1.1 million repaving project in November on Canal Street and then proceeded to Homochitto. However, asphalt was improperly laid on some segments. Work stopped in December – leaving the project unfinished with rough sections on the two much-traveled thoroughfares.

The resurfacing work is expected to resume next week and take about 14 days to finish.

Another Natchez street project with long-term timetable is the replacement of the aged Canal Street bridge.

“It’s nearing the end of its life,” said engineer Ryan Holmes, who reported it was built in the early 1940s.

Meeting Tuesday with Natchez Mayor Dan Gibson and city aldermen, Holmes estimated construction costs for a new bridge would be at least $5 million. With work not expected to begin until around 2030, there’s time to find funding sources that could include the federal government, Gibson said.

“The repairs that have been made give us about a four-to-five-year window to plan for this and to raise funds for this,” the mayor said.

Holmes noted plans he’s drawn would have the new 75-foot bridge looking the same as the current overpass but structurally different underneath.

“If you’re traveling across it this afternoon and you travel across it a few years from now, you won’t notice the difference. It will look the same from above,” he said.

Recent repairs to the bridge have restored its capacity for buses and fire trucks, but Natchez officials continue to ban 18-wheelers from the span. All large vehicles were prohibited from crossing the much-traveled bridge beginning in December 2023, when inspectors discovered corroded undergirdings that rendered it unsafe for heavy weight.

After about $630,000 recently spent on repairs, it was declared safe in February for most vehicles to cross for a few more years. Tractor-trailer trucks continue to be prohibited. 

While city officials have previously surmised the bridge was built around 1960, Holmes put its construction date in the early 1940s. “It’s obviously at the end of its life,” he said.

NATCHEZ, Miss. — Tearing down the downtown Fry building could begin in October as city officials envision the site becoming a parking lot, according to plans discussed Tuesday at the Natchez Board of Aldermen’s meeting.

The board agreed to ask for the Natchez Preservation Commission’s permission to demolish the three-story office building adjacent to the Eola hotel that developers plan to renovate and reopen.

Located on the corner of Pearl and Franklin streets, the Fry building has deteriorated, is laden with asbestos and has been largely vacant for several years. It was donated to the city by Walter Davis III in 2021 with an appraised value of about $1 million.

The city has commissioned environmental assessments of the structure. It’s contaminated with hazardous asbestos and other pollutants, according to a U.S. Environmental Protection Agency report. The EPA awarded the city a $1.1 million grant in 2023 for clean-up costs.

The Fry’s demolition is being paid for with such federal funds along with a possible loan if needed from the Mississippi Department of Environmental Quality, said Mayor Dan Gibson. The city has applied for $500,000 from the agency’s so-called Brownfields Revolving Loan Fund that’s programmed for cleaning up polluted sites that can be rehabilitated and redeveloped for commercial purposes. 

 “This is yet another example of a brownfield turning into a greenfield – and that’s green as in the color of money,” Gibson said.

Making the Fry site a parking lot is considered an essential key for renovating the century-old Eola – plans that have been much-ballyhooed but stalled for several years since the hotel closed in 2014.

Inflation has been a major impediment as renovation costs have soared to about $30 million, but Eola developer Hayes Dent has expressed optimism that financing would be assured for its refurbishment and reopening. This comes as the building approaches being 100 years old in 2027. 

While the timetable for razing the Fry building is “not set in stone” yet, hopes are demolition will start in October, said city Community Development Director James Johnston. “We’re working toward that goal.” 

Tearing down the 1950s-built Fry needs the approval of the Natchez Preservation Commission, which ensures structural changes are appropriate in the city’s historic district that covers downtown Natchez and surrounding residential neighborhoods.

The Fry building was constructed as an office building in 1956 and designed by prominent New Orleans architect Arthur Davis, according to Trulia.com, a subsidiary of the real-estate listing group Zillow.

Davis was described as a “modernist architect who was instrumental in redefining New Orleans’ skyline” by The Times-Picayune newspaper when he died in 2011 at age 91. His architectural firm’s list of buildings include the Louisiana Superdome, the University of New Orleans Lakefront Arena and the city’s Royal Sonesta Hotel, according to Davis’ autobiography “It Happened by Design.”