NATCHEZ, Miss. – Adams County supervisors adopted plans Monday for a new recreation agreement with Natchez officials that does away with their consolidated plan to enhance local parks but continues joint operations of the community swimming pool.
“The city will be handling their parks and we will be handling our parks,” said Adams County board President Angela Hutchins.
This strays from the compact Adams County supervisors and Natchez aldermen formed in 2015 to jointly fund enhancements for the community’s parks and sports offerings, but much of it has fallen by the wayside due to inaction, disunity and change of plans.
County supervisors on Monday indicated they would embark on their own upgrades of county-owned recreation facilities, which include the Liberty baseball park along with LaGrange and Providence parks and other playgrounds. The county could upgrade them with the $343,000 that the county board had been allocating each year for the Natchez-Adams County recreation program, Hutchins said. The county would still put up $100,000 a year for the swimming pool’s operations.
This comes a week after Natchez aldermen voted to seek someone to run the city’s parks and recreation program as Mayor Dan Gibson plans a million-dollar upgrade of the city’s recreation facilities. Gibson said Duncan Park and the city’s five other parks are in “deplorable condition.”
Meeting with aldermen last week, Gibson balked at delaying his pursuit of a parks and recreation director. While Alderman Billie Joe Frazier said county supervisors should be given time to provide their input, the mayor said the city needs to move forward in finding someone to be “aggressive” in directing recreation. “I dare anyone to put this off for another day,” Gibson said.
Adams County Supervisor Ricky Gray said it appears city officials do not want to consolidate park operations with the county. “That decision comes from the city and not the county,” he said.
The city-county’s consolidated recreation program has been largely in disarray since the YMCA stopped operating it in 2019.
The Natchez-Adams County recreation program began six years ago with ambitious plans as the city and county boards formed their compact. The Jackson-based YMCA was contracted to manage recreation, but the organization pulled out in 2019.
Then the Natchez-Adams County Recreation Commission – authorized to run the programs — became largely dysfunctional when it went months without enough members showing up to meet.
The Natchez-Adams County swimming pool at Liberty Park is the main result of the consolidated recreation effort since opening in 2018. The retooled recreation agreement put forward Monday has the city and county continuing to jointly fund the pool’s operations. The proposed agreement also has the city and county maintaining the nearby soccer fields.
Gibson has been promoting a recreational renewal plan he’s developing since taking office as mayor last July. He’s pointed to the prospect of the city borrowing $1.5 million through a bond issue for this.
While he stressed the need last week to focus on the city’s existing parks, he’s previously floated the possibility of building a “sports and wellness center” that could be jointly funded by the city and county.
Meeting May 11 with Natchez aldermen, the mayor indicated his highest priority now is for the city to find and hire a full-time recreation director. Natchez hasn’t had one in several years, which Gibson said is “unbelievable” considering the city’s size.
At Duncan Park, the city already has two contracted golf and tennis pros to run the golf course and tennis courts. While the city and county have had part-time recreation director Faye Minor in place since the YMCA left, her duties have been focused mostly on running the new aquatic center.
As city and county officials rework a new joint recreation agreement, the county Board of Supervisors on Monday met with three candidates to fill vacancies on the Natchez-Adams County Recreation Commission: Bubba Bruce, Jeff Morris and Derrick Baptiste. No official decision was made on who the supervisors will appoint.
Supervisors jointly appoint with city aldermen the commission members – half from the city and half from the county. The commission would focus just on running the aquatic center and soccer fields if the revised agreement is finally enacted by the city and county boards.
The two boards have been haggling over a consolidated recreation program since Natchez-Adams County voters in 2009 endorsed developing a joint city-county recreation plan that envisioned building a central sports complex.
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