NATCHEZ, Miss. (Dec. 14) – Mayor Dan Gibson said his recent trip to Washington, D.C., makes him hopeful Natchez will receive federal funds for improving Morgantown Road, renovating the airport terminal and undertaking other local projects in need of money.
Meeting today with the Natchez Board of Aldermen, the mayor also said U.S. Sen. Roger Wicker of Mississippi might help convince a passenger airline to come to Natchez-Adams County. He noted Wicker has some sway with Contour Airlines, which includes Wicker’s hometown of Tupelo on its routes.
Wicker is the top Republican member of the U.S. Senate Commerce, Science, and Transportation Committee, whose jurisdiction includes aviation regulations.
The Natchez-Adams County Airport has gone about 25 years without regular commercial passenger-airline service.
Another key to getting an airline back to Natchez are riverboats. He said American Cruise Lines, which docks boats here with tourists, has expressed interest in having passengers flown to Natchez to begin their excursions up and down the Mississippi River rather than embarking in larger cities like New Orleans. ACL executives plan to meet with airline officials about this, according to Gibson.
In their meetings last week in Washington with Wicker and other members of Congress, Gibson said, they discussed the prospects for federal funds being allocated to upgrade Morgantown Road, the narrow, flood-prone thoroughfare that’s considered dangerous to drive on. Natchez-Adams County officials have requested $2.4 million to widen and resurface the road. While money is earmarked for this in a pending appropriation bill, Gibson expressed concerns it could get stripped out of the final version next year.
Gibson joined Adams County Board of Supervisors President Angela Hutchins and other local officials for the Washington visit. Their lobbying included attempts to persuade lawmakers to allocate money for refurbishing the Natchez-Adams County Airport Terminal, the main building at the county-owned facility. The terminal was built in 1959.
Gibson also continues to push his plans for new decorative lights being placed on the two Mississippi River bridges linking the Miss-Lou cities of Natchez and Vidalia. While Gibson noted the costs for this could total about $6 million, “great traction” has been made toward getting $4 million from state and federal government leaders from Mississippi and Louisiana. Efforts continue for finding the remaining $2 million, he said.
While Gibson and other local leaders got no guarantees that federal funds are forthcoming for various Natchez-Adams County priorities, they returned home from Washington last week confident about the prospects.
“Many good seeds have been sown. We pray for favor and expect a good harvest,” Gibson said in a Dec. 9 Facebook post.
While no absolute assurances are in hand for federal funds, Gibson said he returned from Washington buoyed by the chances Velocys will build its biofuel plant planned at Adams County’s Belwood industrial site.
While the odds for this happening in recent years were 20 percent, it’s now “looking like 100 percent,” the mayor said.
Plans made public in 2017 got stalled for Velocys to start building the facility as early as 2018, but expectations are now for a 2023 groundbreaking. The billion-dollar plant is projected to employ about 120 workers to process wood debris from area timberlands to convert into jet fuel.(see bayoufuels.com for more information)
Helping local leaders through the U.S. Capitol corridors is Gregg Harper, a former U.S. congressman hired last year by city and county boards to lobby state and federal governments. It’s “not difficult to sell Natchez and Adams County,” Harper told the mayor and aldermen during today’s meeting as they discussed efforts to get federal funds
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